^.•r^s  OF  fmcs 


/; 


h>mM^^'^ 


BV  630  .P7 

Prall,  William,  1853- 

The  sta-te  and  -the  church 


THE  BALDWIN  LECTURES  FOR  1898 


The  State  and  the  Church 


BY 


WILLIAM  PRALL 

Ph.  D.  (Heidelberg),  LL.  B.  (Columbia), 
Hon.  S.  T.  D.  (Hobart) 


NEW  YORK 

THOMAS  WHITTAKER 

2  AND  3  BIBLE  HOUSE 


COPYRIGHT,    1900, 

By  THOMAS  WHITTAKER 


TO 

NICHOLAS  MURRAY  BUTLER 

Dean  of  the  Faculty  of  Philosophy 
Columbia  University 

This  Volume  of  Lectures  is  Dedicated  as  a  Slight 
Tribute  to  Lifelong  Friendship 


EXTRACT  FEOM  THE  DEED  OF  TRUST, 

IN     ACCORDANCE     WITH     THE     PROVISIONS     OF 

WHICH   THE   BALDWIN   LECTURES 

WERE    INSTITUTED. 

"  This  Instrument,  made  and  executed  be- 
tween Samuel  Smith  Harris,  Bishop  of  the  Prot- 
estant Episcopal  Church  in  the  Diocese  of  Michi- 
gan, of  the  City  of  Detroit,  Wayne  County, 
Michigan,  as  party  of  the  first  part,  and  Henry 
P.  Baldwin,  Alonzo  B.  Palmer,  Henry  A.  Hay- 
den,  Sidney  D.  Miller,  and  Henry  P.  Baldwin, 
second,  of  the  State  of  Michigan,  Trustees  under 
the  trust  created  by  this  instrument,  as  parties  of 
the  second  part,  witnesseth  as  follows : — 

"  In  the  year  of  Our  Lord,  one  thousand  eight 
hundred  and  eighty -five,  the  said  party  of  the 
first  part,  moved  by  the  importance  of  bringing 
all  practicable  Christian  influences  to  bear  upon 
the  great  body  of  students  annually  assembled  at 
the  University  of  Michigan,  undertook  to  pro- 
mote and  set  in  operation  a  plan  of  Christian 
work  at  said  University,  and  collected  contribu- 
tions for  that  purpose,  of  which  plan  the  follow- 
ing outline  is  here  given,  that  is  to  say : — 

7 


8  EXTRACT  FROM  THE  DEED  OF  TRUST. 

"1.  To  erect  a  building  or  hall  near  the  Uni- 
versity, in  which  there  should  be  cheerful  parlors, 
a  well-equipped  reading-room,  and  a  lecture-room 
where  the  lectures  hereinafter  mentioned  might 
be  given ; 

"2.  To  endow  a  lectureship  similar  to  the 
Bampton  Lectureship  in  England,  for  the  estab- 
lishment and  defence  of  Christian  truth ;  the 
lectures  on  such  foundation  to  be  delivered 
annually  at  Ann  Arbor  by  a  learned  clergyman 
or  other  communicant  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church,  to  be  chosen  as  hereinafter  provided: 
such  lectures  to  be  not  less  than  six  nor  more 
than  eight  in  number,  and  to  be  published  in 
book  form  before  the  income  of  the  fund  shall  be 
paid  to  the  lecturer ; 

"3.  To  endow  two  other  lectureships,  one  on 
Biblical  Literature  and  Learning,  and  the  other 
on  Christian  Evidences :  the  object  of  such  lec- 
tureships to  be  to  provide  for  all  the  students 
who  may  be  willing  to  avail  themselves  of  them 
a  complete  course  of  instruction  in  sacred  learn- 
ing, and  in  the  philosophy  of  right  thinking  and 
right  living,  without  which  no  education  can 
justly  be  considered  complete  ; 

"  4.  To  organize  a  society,  to  be  composed  of 
the  students  in  all  classes  and  departments  of  the 
University  who  may  be  members  of  or  attached 
to  the   Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  of  which 


EXTRACT  FROM  THE  DEED   OF  TRUST.  9 

society  the  Bishop  of  the  Diocese,  tiie  Rector, 
Wardens,  and  Vestrymen  of  St.  Andrew's  Parish, 
and  all  the  Professors  of  the  University  who  are 
communicants  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church 
should  be  members  ex  officio,  which  society  should 
have  the  care  and  management  of  the  reading- 
room  and  lecture-room  of  the  hall,  and  of  all  ex- 
ercises or  employments  carried  on  therein,  and 
should  moreover  annually  elect  each  of  the  lec- 
turers hereinbefore  mentioned,  upon  the  nomina- 
tion of  the  Bishop  of  the  Diocese. 

"  In  pursuance  of  the  said  plan,  the  said  society 
of  students  and  others  has  been  duly  organized 
under  the  name  of  the  ^Hobart  Guild  of  the 
University  of  Michigan ' ;  the  hall  above  men- 
tioned has  been  builded  and  called  ^Hobart 
Hall';  and  Mr.  Henry  P.  Baldwin  of  Detroit, 
Michigan,  and  Sibyl  A.  Baldwin,  his  wife,  have 
given  to  the  said  party  of  the  first  part  the  sum 
of  ten  thousand  dollars  for  the  endowment  and 
support  of  the  lectureship  first  hereinbefore  men- 
tioned. 

"Now,  therefore,  I,  the  said  Samuel  Smith 
Harris,  Bishop  as  aforesaid,  do  hereby  give, 
grant,  and  transfer  to  the  said  Henry  P.  Bald- 
win, Alonzo  B.  Palmer,  Henry  A.  Hayden,  Sid- 
ney D.  Miller,  and  Henry  P.  Baldwin,  second, 
Trustees  as  aforesaid,  the  said  sum  of  ten  thou- 
sand dollars  to  be  invested  in  good  and  safe  in- 


10         EXTRACT  FROM  THE  DEED   OF  TRUST. 

terest-bearing  securities,  the  net  income  thereof 
to  be  paid  and  applied  from  time  to  time  as  here- 
inafter provided,  the  said  sum  and  the  income 
thereof  to  be  held  in  trust  for  the  following 
uses : — 

"  1.  The  said  fund  shall  be  known  as  the  En- 
dowment Fund  of  the  Baldwin  Lectures. 

"2.  There  shall  be  chosen  annually  by  the 
Hobart  Guild  of  the  University  of  Michigan, 
upon  the  nomination  of  the  Bishop  of  Michigan, 
a  learned  clergyman  or  other  communicant  of 
the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  to  deliver  at 
Ann  Arbor  and  under  the  auspices  of  the  said 
Hobart  Guild,  between  the  Feast  of  St.  Michael 
and  All  Angels  and  the  Feast  of  St.  Thomas,  in 
each  year,  not  less  than  six  nor  more  than  eight 
lectures,  for  the  Establishment  and  Defence  of 
Christian  Truth ;  the  said  lectures  to  be  published 
in  book  form  by  Easter  of  the  following  year, 
and  to  be  entitled  '  The  Baldwin  Lectures ' ;  and 
there  shall  be  paid  to  the  said  lecturer  the  income 
of  the  said  endowment  fund,  upon  the  delivery  of 
fifty  copies  of  said  lectures  to  the  said  Trustees 
or  their  successors ;  the  said  printed  volumes  to 
contain,  as  an  extract  from  this  instrument,  or  in 
condensed  form,  a  statement  of  the  object  ^jid 
conditions  of  this  trust." 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 
I 

THE   BASIS    OF   THE   STATE 

The  Necessity  of  Studying  the  Subject  Matter  of  the  Lectures. 
— The  Influence  of  Prejudice. — Hobbes. — Rousseau. — 
Mulford.— The  Theory  of  Hobbes.— The  Theory  of  Rous- 
seau.—The  Theory  of  Mulford.— The  Basis  of  the  State.— 
The  Prize  Essay  of  George  H.  Smith. — The  Importance 
of  the  Family. — The  Individual. — Aristotle's  Principle. — 
The  Causal  Origin  of  the  State. — The  Declaration  of 
Burke. — The  Historical  Origin. — Sir  Henry  Maine. — 
Ancient  Law. — The  State  a  Natural  Phenomenon. — The 
Social  State  the  Natural  State. — The  State  of  Nature. — 
The  Form  of  Government. — Elements  in  the  Family  and 
State. — Drummond. — Motherhood  and  Fatherhood. — The 
Human  Family. — Giddings. — Marriage  an  Universal  Insti- 
tution.— Westermarck. — The  Family  of  Ancient  and  of 
Modern  Times. — The  Family  as  an  Institution. — Maurice 
on  "  Social  Morality." — The  Distinction  between  Author- 
ity and  Dominion. — A  Man's  Right  to  Govern  His 
Family. — Hobbes'  Assertion. — Authority  and  Obedience. 
— The  Province  of  the  Mother. — The  Family  and  the 
State. — The  Preservation  of  the  Family. — The  Importance 
of  Monogynous  Marriage. — Contrast  between  the  Earlier 
and  Later  Roman  Law. — Seneca,  Tertullian,  on  the  Mor- 
als of  their  Times. — Divorces  in  the  Later  Jewish  Com- 
monwealth.— Josephus. — The  Pronouncements  of  Christ. 
— The  Idea  of  Marriage  Before  and  After  Christ's  Advent. 
— Marriage  in  India. — Christian  Marriage. — The  Stati' 
11 


12  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

of  the  Woman. — The  Status  of  the  Man. — Divorce  Laws 
of  European  States. — Divorce  Procedure, — Individual- 
ism.— Distinction  between  Communistic  and  Particularis- 
tic Societies. — Demolins. — Particularistic  Societies  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon  Peoples. — The  Family  of  the  Anglo-Amer- 
ican.— Westermarck  on  the  Durability  of  Marriage. — 
Marriage  a  Divine  Order. — Marriage  the  Touchstone  of 
Civilization. — Development  of  Society. — Woman  Suffrage. 
— The  Christian  Church  and  Marriage. — The  Roman 
Catholic  and  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Churches. — The 
Responsibility  for  Loose  Views. — The  Necessity  of  Laws 
to  Regulate  Marriage. — Must  be  Viewed  as  Sacramental 
in  Character. — Individualism  in  Marriage  Impossible. — 
The  Multiplication  of  Divorces  a  Symptom  of  Decay. — 
The  Protection  of  the  Family,— The  Task  of  Religion 
and  Education 19 

II 

THE  ANCIENT  STATE 

The  Sources  of  Development  of  the  Modern  State. — The  Sig- 
nificance of  the  Civil  History  of  the  Hebrews. — The 
Stories  of  Abraham  and  Job. — The  Rise  of  the  State  of 
Israel. — The  Patriarchal  Family, — The  Powers  of  Gov- 
ernment.— The  Distinction  between  the  Hebrew  Patri- 
archs and  Other  Chieftains. — Jehovah  of  the  Hebrews. — 
The  Gods  of  the  Gentiles. — St.  Paul's  Speech  on  Mars' 
Hill, — Settlement  of  the  Israelites  in  Canaan, — The  Gen- 
esis of  the  City-States  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans. — 
Fowler. — Fustel  de  Coulanges. — The  Characteristics  of 
Village  Communities.  —  Kinship.  —  Leadership.  —  The 
City-State  of  Athens. — Thucydides. — The  City-State  of 
Rome — The  Family  of  the  Aryans. — The  Power  of  Re- 
ligion.— The  Roman  Gentes. — The  Kings  as  Judges. — 
Grote. — The  Village  Communities  of  the  Latin  People. 


CONTENTS,  13 

PAGE 

— Ancient  Rome. — The  Origin  of  Jerusalem. — The  Book 
of  Judges. — The  Differences  between  the  Early  History 
of  Israel  and  of  Other  Nations. — Church  and  State  in 
Jewish  History. — The  City  of  David. — The  Family  Idea 
among  the  Hebrews. — Among  the  Greeks  and  Romans. 
— Israel  a  Community. — The  Cities  of  the  Greeks  and 
Romans,  Federations. — The  Social  Order  in  Israel. — The 
Aim  of  Moses. — The  Meaning  of  Socialism. — Its  General 
Aim. — Graham. — The  Failure  of  Socialism  in  Israel. — 
The  Development  of  Individualism. — The  Prophets, — 
The  Jewish  Commonwealth  at  the  Time  of  Christ. — The 
Reason  for  its  Decadence. — The  Decline  of  the  Grecian 
Cities. — The  Civic  Life  of  Greece  in  Athens. — Inelasticity 
of  Citizenship. — The  War  of  the  People  against  the  Eu- 
patrids. — Democracies  and  Oligarchies. — Factions  and 
Seditions.  —  Peloponnesian  War.  —  Thucydides,  —  The 
Lack  of  Unity. — Caste  and  Caste  Distinction. — The  Lack 
of  Benevolence. — The  Cause  of  the  Decline  of  the  City- 
State  of  Rome. — Contrast  between  the  Privileged  and 
the  Unprivileged. — Elasticity  of  Roman  Citizenship. — 
Its  Final  Extension.— The  Weight  of  Rome.— The  Im- 
possibility of  Further  Transformation, — The  Loss  of  the 
Family  Idea. — The  Lack  of  a  Feeling  of  Brotherhood. — 
Christianity  too  Late  to  Effect  a  Change  in  the  State .  ,    ,    6i 

III 
THE  MODERN  STATE 

Many  Contrasts  between  the  Modern  and  the  Ancient  State. — 
The  Separation  between  Civic  and  Ecclesiastical  Powers. 
— The  Secular  State, — The  Place  of  Religion, — Sover- 
eignty.— George  H.  Smith. — Limited  and  Unlimited  Sov- 
ereignty,—The  Will  of  the  State,— Aristotle,— The  Abso- 
lute Power  of  the  City-States. — Constitutional  Law. — 
Public  and  Private  Law. — The  Points  of  Departure  of 
Ancient  and  of  Modern  Law. — Impossibility  of  a  State- 


14  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

less  Condition. — Man,  not  the  State,  now  Supreme. — The 
Consequence  of  this  Change  in  Principle. — The  Popular 
Assemblies  of  Ancient  Times. — The  Representative  As- 
semblies of  Modern. — The  Rise  of  Representative  Gov- 
ernment.— The  Modern  Return  to  Direct  Participation 
by  the  People. — The  Source  of  the  English  Parliament. 
— Adams. — Representative  Monarchy  of  England. — Rep- 
resentative Democracy  of  the  United  States. — Interna- 
tional Law. — Roman  Dominion  and  the  Right  of  Con- 
quest.— The  Origin  of  International  Law. — The  Increas- 
ing Internationality  of  Interests. — The  Peace  Conference 
at  the  Hague. — The  One  Thing  Common  in  Ancient  and 
in  Modern  States.— The  Origins  of  the  Ancient  States 
Obscure. — Not  so  of  the  Modern. — The  Philosophy  of 
the  Common  Will.— Willoughby. — The  Social  Instinct. — 

^  Bluntschli. — The  Meaning  of  Nationality. — Brotherhood. 

'  —The  Relation  of  the  State  to  the  Soil.— The  Political 
Side  of  the  Family  Life. — The  Meaning  of  Politics. — 
Political  and  Social  Science. — The  Difference  between 
a  New  State  and  a  New  Government. — Historical  Ex- 
amples.— The  State  of  Watauga. — Roosevelt. — The 
Rise  of  the  States  of  our  Western  Civilization. — The 
Roman  Empire. — More  Reasons  for  the  Decline  of  that 
Empire. — The  Inroad  of  the  Germans, — The  Beginnings 
of  the  Modern  States  of  the  West. — The  Elemental  Forces 
Which  Have  Produced  Them. — The  Roman  Law  and 
System  of  Government. — The  Corpus  Juris  Civilis. — 
Clovis. — Charlemagne. — The  Culture  of  Greece. — Grecian 
Philosophy,  Poetry  and  Art. — Mahaffy. — Their  Indirect 
Influence. — Civilization  and  the  Modern  State. — The 
Teutonic  Peoples. — The  Transformation  of  the  Idea  of 
the  Relation  of  Man  and  the  State. — The  Working  of  Chris- 
tianity and  Germanic  Thought. — Forms  Through  Which 
the  Modern  States  Have  Developed. — The  Motive  Power. 
— The  Greatest  Contribution  of  the  Germans 95 


CONTENTS.  15 


IV 


THE  STATE  AND  THE   CHURCH 

The  State  and  the  Church  in  the  Ancient  World. — The  House 
and  the  Hearth. — Agamemnon. — Romulus. — The  Kingly 
and    Priestly    Offices. — The    Pontifex   Maximus. — The 

-—-  -Priests  and  the  Kings  in  Israel. — The  Religious  Life  of 
the  Jews. — Church  and  State  in  Israel  and  in  England. — 
Marcus  Varro. — Theology  of  the  Classical  Peoples. — St. 
Augustine. — Status  of  Religions  at  Rome  at  the  Founding 
of  the  Church. — Jesus  Christ  and  His  Teaching. — The 
Ancient  Religions  and  the  Pagan  Philosophers. — The 
Attitude  of  Christ  toward  the  Polity  of  Israel.— The 
Kingdom  of  God. — The  Attitude  of  Christ  toward  the»< 
Civil  Authority. — The  Attitude  of  the  Church  toward  th^  . 
State. — The  Antagonism  between  the  Church  and  Clas- 
sical Civilization. — The  Reasons  for  the  Persecution  of 
Christians.— The  Growth  of  the  Church.— The  Visible 
and  the  Invisible  Church. — The  Christian  Ministry. — 
The  Catholic  Church. — Constantine  and  the  Church. — 
The  City  of  the  World  and  the  City  of  God.— The  Supe- 
riority of  the  Heavenly  City. — Constantine's  Conversion. 
— Robertson.  —  Gibbon.  —  The  Labarum.  —  Eusebius. — 
The  Dualism  between  Church  and  State. — Bluntschli. — 
Constantine  to  Charlemagne. — The  Establishment  of  the 
Papacy. — The  Lombard  Conquest  and  the  Bishop  of 
Rome. — Gregory  the  Great. — Roman  Society  and  the 
Sack  of  Rome. — The  Council  of  Sardica  and  the  Roman 
See. — The  Dominion  of  the  Franks  and  the  Advancement 
of  the  Papacy. — The  Coronation  of  Charles  the  Great. — 
Feudalism. — The  Alliance  between  the  Franks  and  the 
Church.— The  Dangers  Thereof.— The  Effort  of  the  State 
to  Absorb  the  Church.— The  Capitularies  of  Charles  the 
Great.— The  Effort  of  the  Church  to  Absorb  the  State.— 
The  Unity  of  the  Empire  and  the  Unity  of  the  Church. 
— The  Power  of  Ideas  in  the  Middle  Ages. — The  Holy 


16  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Roman  Empire  and  the  Holy  Roman  Church. — Bryce. — 
The  Growth  of  the  Papal  Pretensions. — The  Triumph  of 
Hildebrand. — King  John  of  England. — Green. — Inno- 
cent in.  and  the  Translation  of  the  Empire. — The  Ref- 
ormation.— The  Change  of  Ideas. — The  Union  of  Church 
and  State  in  the  Nation. — The  Theory  of  Hooker. — 
Gladstone,  on  Church  and  State. — Macaulay. — Religion 
in  the  National  States. — The  Church  in  France. — The 
American  Idea. — The  Present  Crisis  in  England. — The 
Constitution  of  the  United  States. — Religion  in  the  North 
American  Colonies. — Religious  Toleration  the  Gift  of  the 
Dutch.— New  Amsterdam. — Separation  of  Church  and 
State  the  Gift  of  the  American  People. — Religion  in  the 
United  States. — Christianity  and  Christian  Observances. — 
The  American  Principle  the  Principle  of  Apostolic  Times,  131 

V 

THE   LAW   OF  THE  STATE 

The  Definition  of  Law. — Sidgwick. — Willoughby. — Austin. — 
Smith's  Analysis  of  the  Term  Law  as  Used  by  Austin. — 
Jus  and  Lex. — Roman  Law. — The  Law  of  Rome 
Originally  Customary. — Definitions  of  Jus  and  Lex. — 
The  Historical  School  of  Jurists. — Sir  Henry  Maine  and 
"  Ancient  Law." — Edward  Jenks  and  "  Law  and  Politics 
in  the  Middle  Ages." — Religion  and  Ancient  Law. — De 
Coulanges. — Codes  of  Law. — The  Family  in  Relation  to 
Law. — Jehovah  in  Relation  to  Jewish  Law. — The  Hebrew 
Idea  of  Justice. — Justice  among  the  Classical  Peoples. — 
Political  Justice. — jftis  Genthini  and  Jtis  Nattirale. — 
Edict  of  the  Praetors. — Philosophy  of  the  Stoics  and  Jtis 
Nattirale. — Zeno. — Stoicism  and  the  Religious  Conscious- 
ness of  the  East. — Lightfoot. — The  Development  of  Sto- 
icism in  Rome. — The  Corpus  Juris. — The  Early  Law  of 
England. — «'  Domsday  Book  and  Beyond." — Maitland. — 
Jenks. — The  Norman  Conquest  and  Lanfranc  and  Anselm. 
— The  Civil  and  the  Canon  Law. — The  Treatise  of  Bracton. 


CONTENTS.  17 

PAGE 

— Philosophy  of  the  Rise  of  Law  in  the  Middle  Ages. — 
The  Recovery  of  the  Principles  of  the  Corpus  Juris. — 
Review  of  the  Development  of  Law  and  the  Idea  of  Jus- 
tice.— The  Question  of  Right  and  Wrong. — The  Test  of 
Conduct, — Protagoras. — Plato. — Aristotle. — Fourth  Ec- 
logue of  Virgil. — Isaiah. — The  Advent  of  Jesus  Christ. —  "^'^ 
His  Teaching. — The  Mind  of  Christ. — The  Sermon^ on 
the  Mount. — Effect  of  Christianity  upon  Law.^^Effect  of 
Stoicism. — Christ's  Attitude  toward  the  Civil  Law. — The 
Unity  of  Law  and  Tertullian. — The  Aspiration  of  Justin- 
ian.— Milman. — The  Effect  of  Christianity  upon  our 
Civilization. — Kidd  and  "  Social  Evolution." — The  De- 
structive and  Constructive  Powers  of  Christianity. — 
Lecky  and  "  European  Morals." — The  Decay  of  the  Old 
Religions  and  Ethical  Systems. — Froude. — The  Decay  of 
Roman  Morals. — The  Lives  of  Some  of  the  Csesars. — 
— — — ^The  Teachings  of  Christ. — The  Natural  and  the  Universal 
Family  of  Man. — Justice  in  the  Universal  Family. — The 
Ideal  of  Justice. — The  Family  of  States. — The  Bond  of 
the  Family,  Love. — Brotherhood  in  the  Middle  Ages. — 
St.  Francis. — Feudalism  and  Christian  Brotherhood. — 
The  Breaking  Up  of  Feudalism. — The  Expansion  of  the 
Idea  of  Brotherly  Love. — Justice  in  England  and  in  the 
United  States 175 

VI 

THE    PEOPLE 

The  Citizen  in  the  Ancient  and  in  the  Modern  State. — Who 
and  What  are  the  People  ? — BluntschH. — The  Race  Fac- 
tor.— The  Semitic  and  the  Aryan  Races. — The  Latin,  the 
Teuton  and  the  Slav. — The  Recent  Changes  in  their  Re- 
lations to  One  Another. — The  Greatness  of  the  Teutonic 
Race. — The  Anglo-American. — The  German  Empire. — 
The  State  among  the  Latin  Peoples. — French  and  Eng- 
lish Methods  of  Education. — Demolins. — The  Self-Reli- 
ance    of    the    Americans. — De    Tocqueville. — Self-Help 


18  CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

and  the  Anglo-Saxon  Colonies. — The  Attitude  of  Amer- 
icans toward  the  State. — Silent  Changes  in  the  Constitu- 
tion.— Aristocracy  and  Democracy. — The  Sovereignty  of 
the  People. — The  Popular  Will  and  Public  Opinion. — 
Bryce. — Public  Opinion  and  Religion. — Kidd. — Christian- 
ity in  the  United  States. — The  Ethical  Standard  and  Com- 
mon Sense. — Common  Feeling  in  the  United  States. — The 
Disappearance  of  Classes. — The  Purpose  of  the  Modern 
State. — Lecky  on  the  Rise  of  the  Democratic  Spirit. — 
Democracy  and  Property. — Condition  of  the  Poor  in  the 
Past. — Harriet  Martineau. — Lecky  and  Prejudice. — The 
Decline  of  Representative  Government. — Direct  Partici- 
pation by  the  People. — Government  and  Business. — The 
Rule  of  Democracy. — Corporations. — The  Higher  Inter- 
ests of  Governments. — Democracy  and  the  Lord's  Prayer. 
— The  Two  Questions  of  the  Day. — The  Alliance  of  Busi- 
ness with  Politics. — The  Dangers  Thereof, — The  Remedy, 
— The  Election  of  United  States  Senators. — The  Concen- 
tration of  Wealth. — Inequality  and  State  Socialism. — 
The  Remedy  for  too  Great  Inequalities. — Religious  Sanc- 
tion of  Conduct. — Individualism  and  the  Family. — The 
Family  in  the  United  States. — Joint  Ownership. — The 
Ideal  of  the  Family  in  the  Nation. — The  Strength  of  the 
Community. — The  Maximum  Day  of  Labor. — Democracy 
and  Intellectual  Life. — The  Material  Development  of  the 
United  States. — The  American  People  and  Imagination. 
— Higher  Education. — Venice  and  Art. — Bread  and  the 
Word  of  God.— The  Truly  Beautiful,— The  Kingdom  of 
God, — The  Preaching  of  John  Baptist  and  of  Christ. — 
'—— -  Fatherhood  and  the  Rule  of  God. — Brotherhood  and  De- 
mocracy.— Liberty,  Equality  and  Brotherhood. — The  Ele- 
ment of  Transgression. — Christ  as  the  Supporter  of  the 
State. — The  Church  and  Society. — The  State  and  the 
Church  and  Humanity. — The  Church  the  Upholder  of 
Democracy 219 


LECTUKE  I. 

THE  BASIS    OF   THE   STATE. 

It  is  patent  to  all  who  read,  and  who  reflect, 
in  these  days  of  social  unrest,  that  men  have  out- 
grown their  old  ideas  of  state  and  church,  the 
two  great  organizations  of  society,  and  that  these 
institutions  must  be  reexamined  carefully  and 
critically,  in  order  to  see  what  errors  have  been 
made  in  the  past,  and  to  lay  again,  for  the  fu- 
ture, right  foundations  for  the  proper  conception 
of  the  one  and  the  other.  As  regards  the  state, 
the  fact  is  that  men  have  studied  it  for  the  most 
part  with  prejudices  born  of  the  circumstances  of 
their  lives.  I  have  no  time  to  lay  before  you  the 
stories  of  the  lives  of  all  the  great  jurists  and 
philosophers,  but  let  us  consider  three  of  them, 
that  of  Hobbes,  that  of  Kousseau,  that  of  our 
own  countryman,  Dr.  Mulford.  ^ 

Hobbes  was  born  in  the  year  1588  and  did  not 
write  his  first  original  work,  "  Elementa  Philos- 
ophica  de  Cive^''  until  1642,  and  it  was  not  until 
1651  that  he  published  the  best  known  of  his 

'  The  lives  of  these  men  are  taken  for  examples  because  they 
are  the  most  familiar  to  the  American  student. 

19 


20  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

writings,  ''Leviathan."  In  this  work  he  con- 
tends, as  he  had  done  in  his  previous  publica- 
tions, in  favor  of  a  pure  monarchy,  and  comes  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  "  rights,"  or  just  powers 
of  the  sovereign  over  the  lives  and  fortunes  of 
his  subjects  are  unlimited,  and  that  there  is  a 
corresponding  duty  on  the  part  of  the  subject  to 
obey.  Hobbes  was,  as  we  know,  the  son  of  a 
clergyman  and  was  educated  at  Oxford.  At  the 
age  of  twenty  years  he  entered  the  household 
of  Lord  Hardwicke,  subsequently  the  Earl  of 
Devonshire,  and  with  a  few  breaks  thereafter,  he 
continued  to  be  connected  with  the  Devonshire 
family  until  the  day  of  his  death.  When  we  re- 
flect that  Charles  I.  began  to  reign  in  the  year 
1625,  that  the  Long  Parliament  sat  from  1640  to 
1653,  and  that  the  Commonwealth  prevailed 
from  1649  to  1660,  we  can  understand  why 
Hobbes  exalted  so  much  the  sovereign  power, 
and  contended  for  an  absolute  monarchy. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  that  to  reach  this  con- 
clusion Hobbes  was  compelled  to  assume  the  ex- 
istence of  an  imaginary  contract  between  the  in- 
dividual members  of  the  state,  not  with  the  sov- 
ereign power,  but  with  each  other,  by  which  an 
unlimited  right  or  power  was  conferred  upon 
the  sovereign ;  and  that  Kousseau  should  have 
founded  his  peculiar  views  of  the  state  and  gov- 
ernment  upon   the  identical   basis   of   contract. 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  21 

But  Eousseaii,  we  know,  drew  entirely  different 
deductions  froin  the  social  contract  from  those  of 
Hobbes.  In  his  mind  the  contract  that  was 
originally  entered  into  between  all  the  citizens 
of  a  state  was  a  contract  by  which  every  man 
should  be  equal,  and  no  man  should  have  the 
lordship,  or  sovereignty,  over  any  other.  The 
opening  words  of  the  first  chapter  of  his  famous 
book  read :  "  Man  is  born  free,  and  in  all  places 
he  is  in  chains."  And  in  the  chapter  on  the 
Social  Agreement,  further  on,  he  says :  "  Each 
one  gives  himself  entirely  ;  the  condition  is  the 
same  for  all,  and  the  condition  being  the  same 
for  all,  no  one  has  any  interest  to  render  it  oner- 
ous for  others."  ^  His  "  Contrat  Social "  was 
published  in  the  year  1762.  But  this  is  the  one 
point  that  I  desire  to  make.  Eousseau's  ideas 
were  the  result  of  his  prejudices.  He  was  born 
in  the  year  1712,  a  free  citizen  of  the  free  city  of 
Geneva.  And  he  lived,  for  the  most  part,  in 
down-trodden  France,  in  which  country  he  died 
in  the  year  1778.  He  lived  in  the  times  imme- 
diately preceding  the  French  Eevolution,  and  he 
imbibed  the  ideas  that  were  then  prevalent,  and 
gave  them  forth  to  the  world. 

It  is  evident,  that,  fantastic  as  were  many  of 
Rousseau's  ideas,  the  deductions  that  he  drew 
were  just  as  logical  as  those  of  Hobbes,  perhaps 

»(Chap.  vi.) 


22  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHUBCH. 

more  so ;  for  Hobbes,  besides  assuming  that  the 
individual  members  of  the  state  entered  into  an 
imaginary  contract  by  which  government  was 
established,  supposed  further  that  the  contract 
was  unconditional,  and  that  it  was  irrevocable. 
Whereas,  Eousseau,  with,  I  think  clearer  insight 
into  the  nature  of  man,  avers  that,  if  the  social 
agreement  became  violated,  each  one  enters  into 
his  full  rights,  and  takes  up  again  his  natural 
liberty.  But  the  fault  is  not  so  much  with  the 
deductions  of  each  philosopher,  as  it  is  with  his 
premises.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  was  no  w^ar 
of  all  against  all,  such  as  Hobbes  declared  to 
have  been  the  original  status  of  mankind,  by 
which  they  w^ere  induced  to  make  a  contract  that 
one  should  have  absolute  right  or  sovereignty 
over  the  rest,  for  their  protection ;  nor  was  there 
originally  such  a  state  of  life  as  that  which 
Rousseau  imagined,  a  state  of  nature,  wherein 
men  lived  free  and  idyllic  lives.  The  history  of 
the  origin  of  the  state  and  government  tells  us 
another  thing,  and  so  does  the  causal  origin,  but 
we  will  study  these  later  on.  Let  us  first  ex- 
amine the  conception  of  Dr.  Mulford,  which,  by 
the  way,  was  probably  derived  from  the  late  Mr. 
Gladstone's  book,  "  The  State  in  its  Relations 
with  the  Church." ' 

In  chapter  four  of  "  The  Nation,"  Dr.  Mulford 

'  {Vide,  Vol.  I.,  Chap,  ii.,  Parti.,  68-75.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  23 

says  :  "  The  evidence  of  the  origin  of  the  nation  is 
in  its  necessary  nature. — The  nation  is  an  organic 
unity ;  it  is  not  an  artificial  fabric  nor  an  ab- 
stract system,  but  it  has  a  life  which  is  definite 
and  disparate,  and  has  a  development ;  therefore 
it  has  not  its  origin  in  the  individual  nor  the 
collective  will  of  man,  but  must  proceed  from  a 
power  which  can  determine  the  origin  of  organic 
being ; "  and  again  he  says :  "  The  evidence  of 
the  origin  of  the  nation  is  also  in  its  being  as  a 
moral  person.  There  is  and  can  be  for  personal- 
ity, as  it  transcends  physical  nature,  only  a 
divine  origin,  and  its  realization  is  in  a  divine 
relation.  The  subsistence  of  the  human  per- 
sonality is  in  the  divine  personality,  and  its  reali- 
zation is  in  its  divine  relations,  and  as  with  the 
individual  personality,  so  also  with  the  moral 
personality  of  the  nation, — its  origin  and  its  con- 
sistence can  be  only  in  God."  ^  In  other  words, 
Dr.  Mulford  considers  the  nation  to  be  an  organ- 
ism that  has  life  in  itself,  and  will  and  moral  de- 
termination ;  that  it  is,  in  one  word,  a  moral 
person  created  by  God. 

In  the  first  place,  we  have  to  remark  that  Dr. 
Mulford  uses  the  word  "  nation  "  instead  of  the 
term  "  state "  and  that  therefore  he  excludes 
from  his  idea  of  the  state  not  only  the  village 
and  the  tribe,  but  also  the  city,  which,  with  the 

>(p.  55.) 


24  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

Greeks  and  Komans,  was  the  onl}^  form  of  the 
state  existing.  But  obviously  this  conception  of 
the  state  is  too  restricted.  For  though  in  mod- 
ern times  when  we  use  the  term  "  state "  we 
generally  have  in  view  the  modern,  European, 
national  state,  yet  we  habitually  apply  the  term 
more  extensively.  We  understand  by  the  state 
any  and  all  autonomous  human  societies  in  which 
men  may  live. 

In  the  second  place,  we  must  remark  that  Dr. 
Mulford  begs  the  whole  question.  There  is  ab- 
solutely nothing  upon  which  to  base  the  assertion 
that  God  created  the  state  and  endowed  it  with 
body  and  soul,  and  conscience,  and  other  like 
organs.  It  is  a  beautiful  metaphor  to  say  that 
the  state  is  a  "  moral  organism,"  a  "  moral  per- 
sonality," but  these  expressions  mean  nothing 
more  than  that  the  state  is  a  corporation,  having 
the  attributes  of  a  corporation,  being  not  an 
actual,  but  a  fictitious  person. 

Dr.  Mulford  was  born  in  the  year  1833,  and 
"The  J^ation"  was  published  in  the  year  1870. 
It  is  evident  that  he  was  at  work  upon  his  book 
during  the  long  years  of  the  War  of  the  Eebel- 
lion,  and  probably  during  the  longer  years  of  de- 
bate that  preceded  the  war.  The  questions,  the 
burning  questions  of  his  day  were :  Were  the 
people  of  the  United  States  a  mere  aggregation 
of  individuals,  to  be  separated  at  the  desire  of 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  25 

any  number  of  individuals?  Was  the  union  a 
union  of  a  number  of  states  to  be  divided  at  the 
will  of  any  state  ?  Or,  Were  the  people  a  com- 
pacted and  articulated  body,  the  union  a  single 
sovereign  whole  ?  Those  who  looked  upon  the 
people  as  being  a  mere  aggregation  of  individ- 
uals, and  the  union  as  being  a  number  of  distinct 
and  independent  states,  took  a  low  view  of  the 
corporate  life  of  the  nation,  if  they  had  any  view 
of  it  at  all.  Those  who  looked  upon  the  people 
as  living  in  a  union  of  states  that  was,  indeed 
and  in  truth,  one  distinct  and  sovereign  power, 
grew  to  the  conception  of  the  nation  as  a  high 
ideal  of  righteous  living ;  and  such  an  one  was  Dr. 
Mulf  ord.  And  these  last  gave  to  the  nation  all  the 
attributes  of  personality,  conscience,  will,  moral 
sense  and  unity  of  parts  in  one  whole.  The  ideal 
was  pleasing  to  the  men  of  the  past  generation, 
it  is  pleasing  to  us  still,  but  it  is  only  an  ideal. 

But  what  is  the  state,  and  what  is  the  basis  of 
it  ?  Mr.  George  H.  Smith,  in  his  admirable  prize 
essay,  "  The  Theory  of  the  State  "  ^  considers  that 
all  human  autonomous  societies,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  the  single  family,  are  states,  and  he  founds 
his  views  on  Aristotle's  principle,  which,  as  we 
know,  is  now  universally  accepted  as  the  funda- 
mental fact  of  political  science,  that,  "  Man  is  a 

'  (Eeprinted  Dec.  14th,  1895,  from  Proceedings  of  the  Ameri- 
can Philos.  Society,  Vol.  XXXIV.) 


26  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

political  animal,  and  therefore  he  must  neces- 
sarily always  be  a  citizen,  or  member  of  a  state."  ^ 
In  other  words,  it  is  contrary  to  man's  nature, 
as  universally  observed,  for  him  to  exist  in  a 
stateless  condition.  If  this  deduction  be  true, 
then  when  there  was  but  one  family  on  the  face 
of  the  earth,  there  must  have  been  a  state,  and 
this  Mr.  Smith  seems  to  admit  when  he  says : 
"  Even  with  regard  to  the  family  in  its  simplest 
form,  as  consisting  merely  of  man  and  woman, 
this,  also,  if  Ave  could  conceive  of  it  existing  in- 
dependently— as,  for  instance,  in  the  case  of 
Adam  and  Eve  in  Paradise — might,  with  pro- 
priety, be  called  a  State,  or,  at  least,  a  State  in 
embryo."  ^  A  family,  then,  can  be  a  state,  if  it  can 
exist  independently  of  all  the  other  families  in  the 
world,  as,  for  example,  the  family  of  Abraham, 
in  the  land  of  Canaan.  In  the  family  the  state 
took  its  rise.  By  the  family  it  is  conditioned. 
For  the  family  it  should  exist.  And  this  has 
been  the  cause  of  many  of  the  erroneous  deduc- 
tions that  have  been  made  by  writers  upon  the 
state  and  government.  They  have  regarded  the 
state  as  a  kind,  some  kind,  of  aggregation  of 
men,  and  have  sought  for  the  germ  and  reason  of 
its  development  in  the  nature  of  the  individual, 
or,  if  they  have  looked  upon  the  state  as  made 
up  of  families,  they  have  neglected  to  think  of 
Hp.  55.)  •'{Id.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  27 

the  state  as  the  development  of  the  family,  and 
the  family,  therefore,  as  the  pattern  of  the  state 
and  as  furnishing  the  type  for  its  government. 
The  great  principle  of  Aristotle  himself  that  *'  the 
State  is  a  natural  institution,  and  that  Man  is 
naturally  a  political  animal,"^  has  conduced  to 
this  very  thing,  that  men  have  regarded  man 
as  individual  men,  and  not  man  as  made  up 
of  men  and  women  and  children,  as  man  there- 
fore in  family  relations.  And  yet,  it  is  evident 
that  they  who  have  so  regarded  this  principle 
of  Aristotle  have  never  read  or  understood  his 
argument ;  for  he  shows  conclusively  that  his 
reason  why  "  man  is  naturally  a  political  animal " 
is  that  he  naturally  must  combine  the  male  and 
the  female  "  in  order  to  the  procreation  of  chil- 
dren, nor  is  there  anything  deliberate  or  arbi- 
trary in  their  so  doing;  on  the  contrary,  the 
desire  of  leaving  an  offspring  like  oneself  is 
natural  to  man  as  to  the  whole  animal  and  vege- 
table word."  ^ 

And  then  he  goes  on  to  show  the  genesis  of 
the  state :  "  The  associations  of  male  and  female, 
master  and  slave,  constitute  the  primary  form  of 
household,  and  Hesiod  was  right  when  he  wrote, 

'  Get  thee 
First  house  and  wife  and  ox  to  plow  withal,' 

'  (Politics,  Book  I.,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  5,  Welldon's  Translation.) 

^{Id.  p.  2.) 


28  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

for  an  ox  is  to  the  poor  what  a  servant  is  to  the 
rich.  Thus  the  association  naturally  formed  for 
the  supply  of  everyday  wants  is  a  household ;  its 
members,  according  to  Charondas,  are  '  those 
who  eat  of  the  same  store,'  or,  according  to  the 
Cretan  Epimenides,  '  those  ^vho  sit  around  the 
same  hearth.'  Again,  the  simplest  association  of 
several  households  for  something  more  than  eph- 
emeral purposes  is  a  village.  It  seems  that  the 
village  in  its  most  natural  form  is  derived  from 
the  household,  including  all  the  children  of 
certain  parents  and  the  children's  children,  or,  as 
the  phrase  sometimes  is,  'all  who  are  suckled 
upon  the  same  milk.'  .  .  .  Lastly,  the  asso- 
ciation composed  of  several  villages  in  its  com- 
plete form  is  the  State,  in  which  the  goal  of  full  in- 
dependence may  be  said  to  be  first  attained.  For 
as  the  State  was  formed  to  make  life  possible,  so 
it  exists  to  make  life  good.  Consequently  if  it  be 
allowed  that  the  simple  associations,  i,  e.  the 
household  and  the  village,  have  a  natural  ex- 
istence, so  has  the  State  in  all  cases ;  for  in  the 
State  they  attain  complete  development,  and 
Nature  implies  complete  development,  as  the 
nature  of  anything,  e.  g.  of  a  man,  a  house,  or  a 
horse,  may  be  defined  to  be  its  condition  when 
the  process  of  production  is  complete."  ^ 
f  Man  is  naturally,  then,  a  political  animal  be- 

>  (Id.  pp.  3,  4.  5.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  29 

cause  he  is  a  member  of  a  family,  and  for  no 
other  reason.  His  political  attributes  disappear 
when  he  becomes  an  outcast,  like  Cain ;  and 
this  is  the  causal  origin  of  the  state.  Hence, 
we  must  agree  with  Burke,  that,  "The  state 
ought  not  to  be  considered  as  nothing  better 
than  a  partnership  agreement  in  a  trade  of  pepper 
and  coffee,  calico  or  tobacco,  or  some  other  such 
low  concern,  to  be  taken  up  for  a  little  temporary 
interest  and  to  be  dissolved  by  the  fancy  of  the 
parties.  It  is  to  be  looked  on  with  other  rever- 
ence ;  because  it  is  not  a  partnership  in  things 
subservient  only  to  the  gross  animal  existence  of 
a  temporary  and  perishable  nature.  It  is  a 
partnership  in  all  science  ;  a  partnership  in  all 
art ;  a  partnership  in  every  virtue  and  in  all  per- 
fection." ^  ) 

And  with  this  conclusion  the  account  we  have 
of  the  origin  of  the  state  in  history  agrees. 
When  we  regard  modern  states,  we  are  generally 
able  to  trace  back  the  history  of  each  to  its 
beginning,  but  when  we  look  at  the  ancient 
states,  we  see  that  their  origins  are  obscured  b}^ 
many  legends  and  the  mists  of  mythology.  /AH, 
therefore,  that  we  can  know  of  the  rise  and 
growth  of  the  primitive  state,  with  the  exception 
of  a  few  historical  facts,  is  the  inferences  that  we 

'  (Reflections  on  the  Revolution  in  France,  second  Ed.,  J. 
Dodsley,  Pub.,  p.  143.) 


30  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

draw  from  the  nature  of  man;  but  from  this,  if 
we  reason  rightly,  the  general  course  of  the 
genesis  and  development  of  the  state  may  be 
learned.  In  the  beginning  man  is  found  in 
families,  and  out  of  the  family  society  must 
grow,  as  from  a  germ.  When  society  becomes 
in  any  way  organized,  we  call  its  organization  a 
state,  whether  it  be  the  village,  the  clan,  the 
tribe,  the  city  or  the  nation.  And  this  is  the 
order  of  the  development  of  man  in  political 
relations  as  uniformly  observed!)  Other  causes 
may  concur  in  the  growth  of  the  state,  the  chief 
of  which  is  war,  conquest  and  colonization,  but 
without  these  the  course  of  development,  if  it  had 
not  been  arrested,  would  invariably  have  taken 
place  in  a  state  of  Aryan  and  Semitic  people  as 
stated  above. 

For  this  statement  of  the  manner  of  growth 
and  development  of  the  family  into  the  state  we 
have  many  authorities  Avhich  might  w^ell  be  cited, 
but  I  will  quote  only  the  words  of  Sir  Henry 
Maine,  the  founder  and  chief  exponent  of  the  mod- 
ern school  of  historical  jurisprudence.  "  Archaic 
law,"  says  Sir  Henry,  .  .  .  "is  full,  in  all  its 
provinces,  of  the  clearest  indications  that  society 
in  primitive  times  was  not  what  it  is  assumed  to 
be  at  present,  a  collection  of  individuals.  In 
fact,  and  in  view  of  the  men  who  composed  it,  it 
was  an  aggregation  of  families.    The  contrast  may 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  31 

be  most  forcibly  expressed  by  saying  that  the  miit 
of  an  ancient  society  was  the  Family,  of  a  modern 
society  the  Individual."  ^  I  do  not  care  to  discuss 
at  present  what  would  be  the  result  in  our  modern 
state  if  we  should  regard  society  as  composed  of 
an  aggregation  of  families.  I  will  do  this  later 
on.  My  simple  desire  now  is  to  show  that  the 
family  is  the  basis  of  the  state  and  the  origin  of 
it,  and  that  the  state  cannot,  if  true  to  its  basis 
and  origin,  depart  from  the  family  form  and 
idea. 

From  what  has  been  said  of  the  origin,  both 
of  the  causal  and  the  historical  origin,  of  the 
state,  it  is  evident  that  it  does  not  need  the 
refined  hypothesis  of  a  social  contract,  nor, 
indeed,  of  any  direct  ordination  from  heaven  to 
justify  its  existence,  but  it  is  to  be  regarded  as  a 
phenomenon  naturally  existing  in  the  same  way 
as  man  himself  exists.  The  state  is  a  part  of 
man's  humanity.  Hence  it  is  absurd  to  speak  of 
the  "  state  of  nature  "  as  different  from  the  social 
state,  for  the  social  state  is  the  natural  state  of 
man,  and  the  "state  of  nature  "is  but  another 
name  for  it.  The  term  "  state  of  nature  "  is  very 
commonly  used  to  denote  what  may  be  properly 
called  the  anarchic  state,  that  is,  society  without 
government.  But  in  this  sense  it  denotes  a  purely 
fictitious  idea,  an  idea  which  has  probably  never 

1  (Ancient  Law,  Chap,  v.,  p.  121.) 


32  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

existed  at  all,  and  which  can  only  exist  in  the 
perfected  democracy  of  God,  for  it  is  evident 
that  the  nature  of  man  is  such  as  to  impel  him 
irresistibly  to  live  in  society,  and  that  in  order 
for  him  to  live  a  social  life,  government  of  some 
kind  is  essential.  "When  human  nature  shall  be 
perfected,  then,  and  not  till  then,  will  men  be 
able  to  live  without  any  government  except  the 
will  of  God  as  revealed  in  the  Incarnation. 

Hence,  it  is  wrong  to  lay  too  great  stress  upon 
the  outward  form  of  government.  The  chief 
thing  in  government  is  that  there  shall  be  a  head 
or  a  source  of  authority,  who  will  understand 
that  his  (or  their)  power  is  that  of  a  father,  and 
that  it  is  his  (or  their)  duty  to  secure  the  end  for 
which  the  state  exists,  namely,  the  welfare  and 
happiness  of  all  its  members.  And  this  is  really 
the  prevalent  idea  of  our  age ;  the  German  Em- 
peror, personally,  the  Queen  of  Great  Britain, 
vicariously,  by  her  ministers ;  the  President  of 
the  United  States,  associated  with  congress,  per- 
ceive and  perceive  very  clearly  that  it  is  not  only 
necessary  for  them  to  see  that  the  laws  be  carried 
out,  and  made  effective,  but  to  care  for  the  social 
well-being  of  all  their  subjects  and  fellow-citizens 
from  the  least  unto  the  greatest.  And  this  is  the 
reason  why  the  idea  of  the  state  of  the  socialists  is 
so  weak  they  desire  to  erect  a  paternal  govern- 
ment without  a  head.     Only  a  strongly  consti- 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  33 

tuted  source  of  authority  could  see  to  it  that  their 
principles,  when  made  laws,  should  be  carried 
into  effect ;  and  such  an  authority  they  do  not 
want. 

We  see,  then,  the  great  influence  of  the  family 
as  the  basis  of  the  state  in  its  causal  and  histor- 
ical origin ;  let  us  see  how  important  it  is  as  the 
preserver  of  its  life.  In  the  family  are  contained 
all  the  elements  of  the  state,  order,  authority, 
love,  care,  respect,  obedience,  and  that  mutual 
regard  for  and  consideration  of  the  rights  and 
duties  of  others,  that  make  us  to  feel  and  to 
know  that  the  family  is  divinely  constituted. 
The  germs  of  all  social  obligations  and  duties 
are  found  in  it.  When  a  man  comes  into  the 
world,  it  is  a  long  time  before  he  understands 
that  he  is  an  American  or  an  Englishman  or  a 
German.  It  is  a  long  time  before  he  understands 
that  he  lives  under  the  government  of  a  republic, 
or  of  a  constitutional  monarchy,  or  of  a  benevo- 
lent war-lord;  but  he  understands  almost  with 
the  first  words  that  he  learns  to  use,  that  he  has 
a  father  and  a  mother,  and  perhaps  brothers  and 
sisters,  and  he  learns,  too,  before  long,  in  properly 
constituted  families,  that  order  and  authority  be- 
long to  his  father,  and  that  love  and  care  belong 
to  his  mother,  and  that  his  brothers  and  sisters 
have  equal  rights  to  all  the  good  things  of  life 
with  himself.     And  again  he  learns  that  all  the 


34  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

members  of  the  family  must  conduct  themselves, 
each  to  the  other,  with  due  regard  and  consider- 
ation of  the  fact  that  each  one  is  a  member  also 
of  a  community,  of  which  the  head  is  God,  who 
is  the  Father  of  all  living  souls.  It  is  easy  to 
see  how,  in  such  a  family,  respect  and  obedience 
will  arise  in  the  hearts  of  all  the  children.  There 
are  some  exceptions  to  the  rule  that  all  the  mem- 
bers of  a  family  have  equal  rights  to  the  good 
things  of  life,  because  of  the  desire  to  keep  up 
the  family  position  and  tradition,  but  these  ex- 
ceptions never  quite  destroy  the  feeling  of  equal- 
ity that  exists  between  the  children  of  the  same 
father  and  mother. 

A  recent  writer.  Professor  Drummond  ^  has  said 
that  the  one  motive  of  organic  nature  was  to  make 
mothers,  and  he  has  laid  the  greatest  stress  upon 
the  place  of  motherhood  in  the  family  life.  Far  be 
it  from  me  to  derogate,  or  seem  to  derogate,  in 
any  way  from  the  position  of  woman  and  her  won- 
derful influence  upon  the  life  of  her  offspring ;  but 
I  cannot  but  deplore  the  fact  that  Professor 
Drummond,  as  well  as  many  others  who  have  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously  followed  him,  have  in 
their  exaltation  of  motherhood  lost  sight  of  the 
true  significance  of  fatherhood  in  the  life  of  the 
family  and  of  the  state.  The  fact  of  mother- 
hood,  wonderful    as  it  is,   does  not   suffice  to 

*  (Ascent  of  Man,  Chap,  viii.,  p.  267.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  35 

teach  the  world  of  men  the  things  that  belong 
to  the  family  and  the  social  life.  Nor  will  the 
sweet  feminine  virtues  of  patience,  sympathy  and 
loving-kindness  be  sufficient  to  meet  the  require- 
ments of  the  state  and  government.  There  must 
be  first  of  all  authority  and  obedience.  Author- 
ity and  obedience  are  evolved  out  of  the  fact  of 
fatherhood.  Keason  the  process  of  evolution 
back  as  far  as  you  will,  the  child,  who  knows 
nothing  of  the  process  of  birth,  is  just  as  soon 
impressed  by  the  fatherhood  of  the  man  as  by 
the  motherhood  of  the  woman.  We  are  none  of 
us  grateful  for  the  care  and  protection  that  either 
of  our  parents  has  bestowed  upon  us,  until  the 
advancing  years  have  taught  us  what  their  care 
and  protection  mean  and  have  meant. 

If  the  basis  of  the  state  is  the  family,  the  basis 
of  the  family  is  authority,  for  without  some  au- 
thority, some  headship,  children  would  not  be 
born  into  a  family  but  into  a  horde  or  group. 
Indeed,  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  that  the 
family  would  ever  have  become  instituted  with- 
out authority.  Headship  or  authority  a  man 
must  have  if  he  is  to  protect  his  wife  and  chil- 
dren, and  obedience  is  the  price  of  protection. 
It  may  have  been  that  the  earliest  and  simplest 
form  of  the  human  family  was  "a  pairing  ar- 
rangement  of  relatively  short  duration,"  ^  and 

'  (Giddings,  Principles  of  Sociology,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  155.) 


36  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

that  the  oldest  ethnical  organization  was  the 
metronymic  group,  that  is,  a  group  in  which  all 
relationships  are  traced  through  mothers ;  and 
yet  we  must  observe  that  out  of  such  a  group  a 
state  never  took  its  rise  and  developed.  The  pa- 
tronymic family  must  first  have  been  established, 
or  at  least  the  headship  and  autocracy  of  the 
father  acknowledged.  We  must  take  the  world 
of  men  as  we  see  them,  and  as  history  shows 
them.  "  Everywhere,"  says  Westermarck,  "  we 
find  the  tribes  or  clans  composed  of  several  fam- 
ilies, the  members  of  each  family  being  more 
closely  connected  with  one  another  than  with 
the  rest  of  the  tribe.  The  family,  consisting  of 
the  parents,  children,  and  often  also  of  their  next 
descendants,  is  a  universal  institution  among  ex- 
isting peoples.  And  it  seems  extremely  probable 
that,  among  our  earliest  human  ancestors,  the 
family  formed,  if  not  the  society  itself,  at  least 
the  nucleus  of  it."  ^  And  again,  he  says,  "  I  do 
not,  of  course,  deny  that  the  tie  which  bound 
the  children  to  the  mother  was  much  more  in- 
timate and  more  lasting  than  that  which  bound 
them  to  the  father.  But  it  seems  to  me  that  the 
only  result  to  which  a  critical  investigation  of 
facts  can  lead  us  is,  that  in  all  probability  there 
has  been  no  stage  of  human  development  where 
marriage  has  not  existed,  and  that  the  father  has 

*  (History  of  Human  Marriage,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  41.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  37 

always  been,  as  a  rule,  the  protector  of  his  fam- 
ily."^ 

But  we  must  not  think  of  the  family  of  ancient 
times,  as  shown  to  us  in  archaic  law,  as  being 
exactly  that  which  the  family  is  to-day.  The 
family  in  ancient  times  was  like,  and  yet  it  was 
in  many  ways  unlike,  the  family  of  to-day.  "  In 
order  to  reach  the  ancient  conception,  we  must 
give  to  our  modern  ideas  an  important  extension 
and  an  important  limitation.  We  must  look  on 
the  family  as  constantly  enlarged  by  the  absorp- 
tion of  strangers  within  its  circle,  and  we  must 
try  to  regard  the  fiction  of  adoption  as  so  closely 
simulating  the  reality  of  kinship,  that  neither 
law  nor  opinion  makes  the  slightest  difference 
between  the  real  and  an  adoptive  connection. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  persons  theoretically 
amalgamated  into  a  family  by  their  common 
descent  are  practically  held  together  by  common 
obedience  to  their  highest  living  ascendant,  the 
father,  grandfather,  or  great-grandfather.  The 
patriarchal  authority  of  a  chieftain  is  as  neces- 
sary an  ingredient  in  the  notion  of  the  family 
group  as  the  fact  (or  assumed  fact)  of  its  having 
sprung  from  his  loins ;  and  hence  we  must  un- 
derstand that  if  there  be  any  persons  who,  how- 
ever truly  included  in  the  brotherhood  by  virtue 
of  their  blood-relationship,  have  nevertheless  de 

^{Id.  p.  50.) 


38  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

facto  withdrawn  themselves  from  the  empire  of 
its  ruler,  they  are  always,  in  the  beginnings  of 
law,  considered  as  lost  to  the  family.  It  is  this 
patriarchal  aggregate — the  modern  family  thus 
cut  down  on  one  side  and  extended  on  the  other 
— which  meets  us  on  the  threshold  of  primitive 
jurisprudence.  Older  probably  than  the  State, 
the  Tribe  and  the  House,  it  left  traces  of  itself 
on  private  law  long  after  the  House  and  the 
Tribe  had  been  forgotten,  and  long  after  con- 
sanguinity had  ceased  to  be  associated  with  the 
composition  of  States."^  It  is  in  the  family, 
then,  that  there  is  first  found  authority,  and 
not  only  authority  but  obedience,  the  two 
great  pillars  of  government  and  the  state. 
And  the  family  as  looked  at  from  the  stand- 
point of  ancient  jurisprudence,  or  historically, 
is  not  the  natural  family,  but  the  natural 
family  and  something  besides,  the  natural 
family  with  the  principles  of  adoption  and  ex- 
clusion added.  And  herein  we  have  outlined 
the  distinction  and  yet  practical  agreement  in 
a  state  of  the  natural  born  and  naturalized 
citizen. 

In  his  lectures  on  "  Social  Morality  "  ^  Maurice 
has  shown  us  the  great  place  that  authority  has 
in  the  life  of  the  family  and  state.     His  words 

*  Maine,  Ancient  Law,  Chap,  v.,  p.  128,  et  seq.) 
2  (Lecture  II.,  p.  22.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  39 

are  so  clear  and  his  reasoning  so  cogent  that  it 
seems  wiser  for  me  to  quote  them  than  to  make 
a  paraphrase  of  his  ideas;  and  yet  the  things 
that  I  desire  to  bring  before  you  are  so  mixed 
with  others  that  are  not  pertinent,  that  I  will 
have  to  do  so.  At  the  basis  of  all  relationship 
is  the  fact  that  we  are  sons.  I  cannot  be  the 
centre  of  the  circle  in  which  I  find  myself,  be  it 
as  small  as  it  may ;  I  must  refer  myself  to  an- 
other, there  is  a  root  behind  me.  There  is  an 
author  of  my  existence ;  and  herein  lies  the  great 
significance  of  the  fact.  As  soon  as  I  recognize 
an  author  of  my  being,  I  recognize  an  authority 
over  me.  It  will  not  do  to  say  that  a  child 
knows  anything  about  the  meaning  of  the  terms 
"  author "  and  "  authority,"  but  it  understands 
that  there  is  a  tie  which  it  must  observe,  which 
binds  it  and  another  together.  In  the  very  fact 
of  fatherhood  authority  is  involved,  and  this  all 
men  learn  in  the  filial  relation.  It  is  strange, 
but  experience  teaches  us  that  children  do  not 
learn  what  authority  means  from  their  mothers ; 
they  learn  what  love  means  from  them,  but  au- 
thority they  refer  to  their  fathers.  Maurice  goes 
on  to  show  the  distinction  between  authority  and 
dominion,  and  this  distinction,  it  seems  to  me,  we 
ought  always  to  have  in  mind,  for  it  is  a  great 
and  useful  one.  If  it  had  been  understood  and 
observed  in  the  past,  the  course  of  history  would 


40  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH, 

have  been  far  different  from  what  it  has  been, 
and  many  of  the  cruel  internecine  wars  that  his- 
tory records  would  have  been  avoided.  Domin- 
ion is  the  power  that  men  possess  over  things  (it 
may  be  over  men  as  well)  which  has  in  it  nothing 
of  an  ethical  or  moral  obligation.  Authority  is 
always  bound  up  with  ethical  and  moral  con- 
siderations. It  has  in  it  the  conception  of  re- 
ciprocal relations  and  duties.  Authority  carries 
with  it  the  idea  of  author.  The  thing  or  person 
over  which  authority  is  had  has  relation  to  the 
author,  and  the  author  to  it  or  him.  Where 
there  is  dominion,  there  is  subjection;  where 
there  is  authority,  there  is  obedience.  Authority 
and  obedience  are  the  distinctive  principles  of 
the  family  life,  and  these  are  the  fundamental 
principles  of  society. 

What  right  has  a  man  to  govern  his  family  ? 
The  right  of  author.  What  right  have  men  to 
govern  in  society  ?  The  same  right  of  author,  if 
not  the  actual,  the  delegated  rights  of  the  many  ; 
for  no  man  ever  had  the  right  of  dominion  over 
his  brothers.  Men  have  usurped  and  acquired 
powers  of  dominion  over  others,  but  they  have 
never  had  the  right  of  dominion.  God's  own 
right  is  the  right  of  author  over  the  children 
whom  He  calls  His  sons.  He  has  limited  Him- 
self to  such  right  when  He  showed  men  that  He 
was  their  Father.    No  men,  no  set  of  men,  can 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  41 

have  rights  superior  to  those  of  the  Creator. 
It  is  to  be  observed  that  Hobbes^  asserts  that 
men  have  the  right  of  dominion  over  their 
children.  "Dominion,"  he  says,  "is  acquired 
two  ways ;  by  generation  and  by  conquest.  The 
right  of  dominion  by  generation  is  that  which 
the  parent  hath  over  his  children  and  is  called 
*  paternal.'  "  With  the  change  of  view  in  regard 
to  the  right  of  sovereigns  has  come  the  change 
in  regard  to  the  right  of  parents,  and  vice  versa. 
On  the  other  hand,  everybody  owes  the  duty  of 
obedience  where  there  is  authority,  for  obedi- 
ence, as  distinct  from  subjection,  is  implied  in 
the  very  fact  of  authority.  But  obedience,  like 
authority,  has  in  it  a  moral  and  not  a  physical 
obligation.  It  is  when  the  moral  obligation  is 
lost  sight  of,  that  authority  becomes  dominion, 
and  obedience  subjection.  It  is  true  that  this 
has  often  occurred  even  in  families,  but  then  the 
life  of  that  family  was  not  the  normal  life  of 
man,  rather  was  it  the  life  of  brutes.  The  life 
of  man  can  only  exist  where  there  is  love,  the 
life  of  brutes  can  exist  where  there  is  only  fear. 
Now,  it  is  the  province  of  the  woman,  of  the 
mother,  to  awaken  love.  She  makes  the  son  to 
see  that  the  father's  authority  is  not  dominion, 
but  that  it  is  based  on  good  will  and  right  in- 
tent, and  she  makes  the  father  to  understand 

'  (Leviathan,  Chap,  xx.,  p.  96,  Morley's  Universal  Library.) 


42  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

that  the  son's  obedience  is  not  subjection,  but 
that  it  is  based  on  reverence  and  proper  re- 
spect. It  is  strange  that  the  place  of  woman 
is  so  well  understood  in  the  family,  but  that 
it  has  rarely  been  understood  in  the  state.  In 
the  modern  state  many  women  desire  to  have 
the  place  of  authority  that  men  ought  to  have, 
and  thus  they  miss  their  real  and  essential  voca- 
tipn. 

(  The  family,  then,  is  the  basis  of  the  state,  and 
out  of  it  the  state  has  grown.  In  it  the  state 
finds  its  type  and  model.  In  it  it  should  find  its 
effective  power.  How  necessary,  then,  for  the 
preservation  of  the  life  of  the  state  are  the  life 
and  stability  oi  the  family!  The  bond  of  the 
family  is  marriage;  the  union  usually  of  one 
man  with  one  woman  and  the  children  that 
spring  from  that  union.  )  It  is  true  that  in  some 
countries  polygynous  and  polyandrous  mar- 
riages have,  and  do,  prevail ;  but  states  wherein 
polygamy  exists  are  weak.  Polyandry  is  an  in- 
stitution of  low  and  barbarous  peoples,  such  as 
can  scarcely  be  said  to  have  founded  states. 
Government  by  authority  and  submission  by 
obedience  cannot  be  postulated  of  polygamous 
states.  The  rule  of  the  Sultans  of  Islam  has 
been,  and  is,  only  dominion,  the  relation  of  their 
subjects  to  /them  has  been,  and  is,  only  one  of 
subjection.  ;  How  important,  then,  is  monogamy, 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  43 

that    is,   the    marriage    qf  one  man  with  one 
woman,  and  that  for  life.O 

And  yet,  as  it  seems  during  the  last  years  of 
this  century,  more  has  been  done  to  destroy  the 
institution  of  marriage  in  Christendom  than  in 
any  of  the  ages  of  the  world  since  Christ  came 
on  earth  and  reestablished  it.  The  trouble  in 
regard  to  marriage  has  arisen  out  of  the  modern 
conception  that  it  is  merely  a  civil  contract  with 
which  the  individuals  only  are  concerned; 
though  it  is  admitted  that  the  state  has  a  right 
of  oversight  for  its  own  purposes.  This  was 
certainly  the  view  that  was  prevalent  in  the  Eo- 
man  world  at  the  time  of  the  advent  of  our 
Lord;  but  it  had  not  always  been  so.  Mar- 
riages earlier  in  Greece  and  Kome  had  generally 
been  contracted  with  religious  ceremonies,  and 
for  many  years  divorces  were  unknown  at  Kome. 
Under  the  later  Eoman  law  marriage  became  a 
mere  contract  and  a  man  could  put  away  his 
wife  and  a  woman  could  put  away  her  husband 

'  "  As  a  general  rule,  human  marriage  is  not  necessarily  con- 
tracted for  life,  and  among  most  uncivilized  and  many  ad- 
vanced peoples  a  man  may  divorce  his  wife  whenever  he  likes. 
Nevertheless,  divorce  is  an  exception  among  a  great  many 
races,  even  among  races  of  the  lowest  type;  and  numerous  na- 
tions consider,  or  have  considered,  marriage  a  union  which  must 
not  be  dissolved  by  the  husband,  except  for  certain  reasons 
stipulated  by  custom  or  law."  (History  of  Human  Marriage, 
Chap,  xxiv.,  p.  549.) 


44  THE  CHURCH  AND   THE  STATE. 

for  any  cause,  so  that  Seneca  speaks  in  one  of 
his  writings  of  "  daily  divorces,"  and,  in  another 
well-known  passage  of  his  works,  of  "  illustrious 
and  noble  women  who  reckoned  the  number  of 
their  years,  not  by  the  consuls,  but  by  their  hus- 
bands." ^  "  Illustres  qucedaTTi  ac  nohiles  foeminoe 
non  consulum  numero,  sed  Ttiaritorum  annos  suos 
computanV)  And  Tertullian,  denouncing  the  de- 
generacy of  the  Koman  matrons  of  his  day,  says : 
"  Where  is  that  happiness  of  married  life  ever  so 
desirable  which  distinguished  our  earlier  man- 
ners, and  as  the  result  of  which  for  about  six 
hundred  years  there  was  not  among  us  a  single 
divorce?  Now,  women  have  every  member  of 
the  body  heavy  laden  with  gold;  wine-bibbing 
is  so  common  among  them,  that  the  kiss  [of 
salutation  to  their  relatives]  is  never  offered  with 
their  will ;  and  as  for  divorce,  they  long  for  it  as 
though  it  were  the  natural  consequence  of  mar- 
riage."^ 

And  divorces  seem  to  have  grown  very  com- 
mon in  the  later  Jewish  commonwealth,  as 
common,  indeed,  as  in  the  Eoman.^  In  the 
Jewish  law,  however,  there  was  a  protection 
to  the  woman  that  the  Eoman  law  did  not  pro- 
vide.    The  man  who  put  away  his  wife  had  to 

'  {De  Benef.  Lib.  III.,  Cap.  XVI.) 

^  {Apol  Chap.  vi. ) 

3  (Life  of  Flavius  Josephus,  Sec.  76.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  45 

give  her  a  bill  of  divorcement,  stating  the  reason 
why  he  put  her  away.  But  Christ  said :  "  It  was 
said  also,  Whosoever  shall  put  away  his  wife,  let 
him  give  her  a  writing  of  divorcement:  but  I 
say  unto  you,  that  every  one  that  putteth  away 
his  wife,  saving  for  the  cause  of  fornication, 
maketh  her  an  adulteress :  and  whosoever  shall 
marry  her  when  she  is  put  away,  committeth 
adultery."  ^  And  again  he  said  :  "  Have  ye  not 
read,  that  He  which  made  the7n  from  the  begin- 
ning made  them  male  and  female,  and  said.  For 
this  cause  shall  a  man  leave  his  father  and  mother, 
and  shall  cleave  to  his  wife ;  and  the  twain  shall 
become  one  flesh?  So  that  they  are  no  more 
twain,  but  one  flesh.  What  therefore  God  hath 
joined  together,  let  no  man  put  asunder."^ 
Herein  we  see  an  entirely  different  conception  of 
marriage  from  that  which  prevailed  in  the  world 
before  Christ's  advent.  Not  that  marriage  had 
not,  previous  to  this  announcement  by  Christ, 
been  looked  upon  as  a  thing  that  had  in  it  some 
religious  character.  The  Koman  patricians  at 
their  nuptials  made  a  sacrifice  to  the  gods,  and  the 
contracting  couples  were  united  with  prayer.  It 
is  probable  also  that  a  consecration  took  place 
on  the  day  of  the  betrothal  or  wedding  among 
the  Hebrews  ;  but  never,  before  Christ  taught, 
had  men  and  women  been  looked  upon  as  con- 
'  (St.  Matt.  V.  31,  32,  K.  v.)  ^  (St.  Matt.  xix.  4-7.) 


46  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

stituting  one  flesh  because  of  a  religious  sanc- 
tion. In  the  early  Koman  law  of  marriage,  the 
wife  became  not  one  with,  and  thus  equal,  with 
the  man,  but  she  came  under  his  ipower j—patria 
potestas — as  a  daughter.  In  the  oldest  Eoman 
law  a  woman  was  considered  to  be  under  per- 
petual tutelage,  and  though  released  from  her 
father's  authority  by  his  decease,  she  continued 
to  be  subject  to  her  nearest  male  relations,  or  to 
her  father's  nominees  as  her  guardians.  In  In- 
dia this  system  survives  in  absolute  complete- 
ness to  this  day,  and  by  its  operation  a  Hindu 
woman  frequently  becomes  the  ward  of  her  own 
sons. 

It  was  the  making  of  woman  one  flesh  with 
man,  and  the  conception  of  what  this  thing 
really  meant,  that  raised  her  to  the  high  place 
she  has  ever  since  held  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  and  made  monogamy  the  only  form  of 
marriage  known  to  Christendom.  Indeed,  so 
strict  did  the  early  Christians  become  in  their 
ideas  concerning  marriage  that  monogamy  with 
them  was  not  what  it  had  been  in  the  Koman 
law  and  what  it  is  with  us  to-day,  the  union  of 
one  man  with  one  woman  for  life ;  rather  was  it 
regarded  as  the  union  of  one  man  with  one 
woman  forever.  A  second  marriage  after  bap- 
tism disqualified  a  man  for  being  ordained ;  ^  and 

i(Ap.  Can.  XVII.) 


THE  BASIS  OF   THE  STATE.  47 

although  persons  who  had  been  twice  married 
were  permitted  by  indulgence  to  communicate 
after  a  short  time  spent  in  prayer  and  fasting  ^  a 
presbyter  was  forbidden  to  be  a  guest  at  the 
nuptials  of  persons  contracting  second  marriages  ^ 
"  for  if,"  (as  it  said)  "  the  bigamist  is  worthy  of 
penance,  what  shall  the  presbyter  be,  who,  on 
account  of  the  feast,  sanctions  the  marriage?" 
It  is  true  that  woman  has  been  under  many  and 
severe  legal  disabilities  in  the  so-called  Christian 
states,  but  this  has  been  by  reason  of  the  sur- 
vival of  old  heathen  manners,  and  a  too  strict 
following  by  canonists  of  the  early  Eoman 
law. 

It  is  to  be  remembered  that  at  the  time  of  the 
later  Eepublic  and  early  Empire,  the  ancient 
forms  of  marriage  having  fallen  into  disuse,  a 
fashion  of  marriage  came  in,  founded  on  an  old 
form  of  marriage  between  plebeians,  that  was 
nothing  more  than  a  civil  contract,  by  which  the 
wife  was  "deposited"  with  her  husband,  the 
rights  of  her  family  being  retained.  And,  as 
these  rights  had  been  reduced  to  a  minimum  by 
the  decrees  of  the  Praetors,  the  woman  became 
absolutely  free  to  do  as  she  chose.  Hence  arose 
the  many  marriages  of  the  same  woman  with 
many  men,  and  the  ever-recurring  divorces  that 
disgraced  and  demoralized  society  in  the  days  of 

'  (Can.  Laod.  I.)  '  (Can.  Neo.-Caes.  VII.) 


48  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH, 

the  early  Caesars.  It  was  against  these  marriages 
and  their  concurrent  divorces  that  the  church 
resolutely  set  its  face.  At  an  early  period  of  the 
church's  history  no  marriage  was  said  to  be 
Christian  without  the  blessing  of  the  priest.  In 
the  middle  ages  a  religious  ceremony  was  gen- 
erally made  obligatory  by  law.  With  us  to-day, 
as  we  know,  owing  to  the  "  Married  Woman's 
Acts,"  a  woman  is  not  only  absolutely  free  in 
the  disposal  of  herself,  but  she  retains  all  her 
rights  to  her  own  property.  A  married  woman 
is  as  free  as  a  single  one  so  far  as  the  law  goes. 
And  there  are  in  nearly  all  the  states  so  many 
causes  for  which  she  can  obtain  a  divorce  from 
her  husband  that  it  can  be  said  that  she  can  ob- 
tain a  divorce  at  will. 

Of  the  status  of  the  man  it  is  not  necessary  to 
speak,  as,  except  where  the  institution  of  patria 
potestas  has  prevailed,  he  has  been  free  to  dis- 
pose of  himself,  and  has,  within  certain  restric- 
tions, had  the  ownership  of  his  own  property. 
For  the  most  part,  too,  he  has  had  the  right  of 
divorcing  his  wife  for  cause  and  for  no  cause. 
His  rights  to-day  over  his  person  and  property 
are  no  greater  than  those  of  the  woman,  if  they 
are  as  great.  Thus,  in  some  states  of  the  union 
the  "  estate  by  the  courtes}''  "  having  been  abol- 
ished, married  women  can  conve}^  and  alienate 
their  real  property  without  the  consent  of  their 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  49 

husbands  ;  but  wives  have  still  an  inchoate  right 
of  dower  in  their  husbands'  lands.  As  to  mar- 
riage, the  drift  in  the  past  century  in  all  coun- 
tries of  Europe  and  America,  has  been  to  regard 
it  ever  more  and  more  as  a  purely  civil  contract. 
Yet  among  Christian  people  it  is  the  custom  to 
ask  the  benediction  of  the  church.  In  many 
countries  the  priests  and  other  ministers  of  God 
are  made  the  officers  of  the  state  to  perform 
marriage. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  examine  the  divorce  laws 
of  the  European  states.  The  English  Divorce 
Act  was  not  passed  until  the  year  1857,  the  laws 
of  Germany  and  Switzerland  were  not  enacted 
until  1874  and  1875,  and  that  of  France  as  re- 
cently as  1884.  And  yet  so  many  and  so  fre- 
quent have  been  the  applications  for  divorce, 
especially  in  France,  that  even  the  politicians 
have  become  alarmed  for  the  safety  of  society. 
Let  us  glance  at  the  laws  relating  to  divorce  in 
our  own  land.  It  is,  as  I  take  it,  the  chief  fault 
of  the  constitution  of  the  United  States  that  the 
status  of  its  citizens,  with  the  exception  of  the 
negro,  is  determined  by  the  laws  of  the  several 
states ;  that  is,  that  the  citizens  of  the  United 
States  are  citizens,  first,  of  their  respective  states 
of  the  union,  and  then  of  the  United  States. 
Thus  it  is  that  the  laws  that  relate  to  marriage 
and  divorce,  as  well  as  to  many  other  things, 


50  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

have  to  be  enacted  by  the  states.  It  would  be 
impossible  for  me  here  to  classify  and  to  enumer- 
ate all  the  various  causes  that  have  existed  or 
that  do  exist  for  divorce.  One  may  say,  on  look- 
ing over  the  various  provisions  that  the  different 
state  legislatures  have  made :  "  Quot  homines, 
tot  sententicB  J  quot  civitates,  tot  leges.^''  At  the 
present  moment  there  are  in  the  United  States 
competent  courts  in  every  state  but  one  to  which 
restless  and  unhappy  men  and  women  can  have 
recourse.  The  petitioner  can  take  his  or  her 
choice,  subject  to  a  trifling  delay  and  residence 
for  the  purpose  of  jurisdiction,  of  forty-nine  dif- 
ferent laws.  There  are  forty-one  different  causes 
which  will  entitle  him  or  her  to  absolute  relief, 
and  thirty-two  giving  limited  divorce.^ 

When  we  read  of  such  legislation  as  this  and 
learn  of  the  lax  manner  of  procedure  under  the 
divorce  laws  in  the  various  state  courts  of  the 
union,  we  can  easily  see  how  strong  are  the 
blows  that  have  been  struck  at  the  basis  of  so- 
ciety, how  fast  are  the  state  and  government 
tending  to  disintegration  here  in  the  United 
States.  It  is  true  that  individualism  has  done 
much  to  develop  the  spirit  of  humanity  and  to 
rear  the  fabric  of  freedom,  and  yet  the  individ- 
ualism that  arose  and  struck  off  the  bonds  of 
ecclesiastical  and  monarchical  governments  was 

'  (Publications  Mich.  Pol.  Science  Asso.,  April,  1895,  p.  59.) 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  51 

not  the  individualism  of  to-day,  which  would 
break  up  the  family  life  and  society  into  monads ; 
rather  was  it  the  individualism  of  the  heads  of 
families,  demanding  for  all  their  members  the 
rights  of  family  life,  and  for  society  its  proper 
mould  and  form. 

The  distinction  made  by  M.  Demolins  between 
society  of  a  communistic  and  of  a  particularistic 
formation^  has  undoubtedly  a  basis  of  truth. 
All  societies  have  a  tendency  toward  either 
one  or  the  other  of  these  modes  of  existence; 
but  to  say  that  they  divide  upon  this  forma- 
tion and  that  upon  this  division  hangs  their 
strength  or  lack  of  strength,  is  to  allege  too 
much,  and  begs  the  question  propounded  in  his 
book.  It  is  evident  that  societies  where  there  is 
a  tendency  to  rely  upon  oneself,  and  not  upon 
the  community,  will  be  superior  to  those  where 
the  tendency  is  to  rely  upon  the  community,  and 
not  upon  oneself,  and  that  the  former  will  suc- 
ceed in  the  long  run  in  the  struggle  for  life  bet- 
ter than  the  latter.  But  we  must  have  a  care ; 
the  societies  of  a  particularistic  formation  (if  the 
Anglo-Saxon  peoples  are  their  best  exponents) 
are  not  exactly  what  M.  Demolins  seems  to  imply 
that  they  are :  societies  wherein  the  individual  is 
all  in  all  and  the  family  is  of  secondary  impor- 

'  {A  quoi  tient  la  superioritS  des  Anglo-Saxons^  Liv.  I.,  Chap. 
iii.,  p.  53.) 


52  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

tance.  The  family  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  (or  Ameri- 
can) has  never  had  the  same  form  it  has  had  in 
France  or  in  Germany,  owing  probably  to  the 
fact  that  the  Koman  law  was  never  the  common 
law  of  England  and  America,  and  its  early  rigid 
maxims  therefore  of  as  high  a  value  as  its  later 
liberal  principles ;  but  it  has  had  no  less  stability, 
and  has  been  of  no  less  consequence  in  the  de- 
velopment of  the  Anglo-Saxon  and  American 
peoples. 

The  Anglo-Saxons  have  taken  their  homes 
and  all  their  home  institutions  with  them  every- 
where under  the  sun.  As  colonists  they  have 
always  emigrated  with  their  women  and  chil- 
dren, to  the  bleak  shores  of  Massachusetts,  to 
the  fertile  river  bottoms  of  Virginia,  to  the 
colonies  of  the  African  Cape,  to  India,  yes,  even 
to  Australia,  though  at  first  the  men  went  to  that 
island  alone.  On  the  other  hand,  women  have 
ever  had  to  be  sent  to  the  French  colonies ;  and 
it  is  the  same  to-day  as  it  was  three  hundred 
years  ago.  And  this  custom  that  we  have  ob- 
served to  exist  in  the  Anglo-Saxons  we  see  like- 
wise in  the  Americans.  They  rarely,  if  ever,  be- 
come mere  coureurs  de  hois  and  outlaws.  Where- 
ever  they  went  as  pioneers  into  the  wilderness  of 
their  broad  land  they  built  themselves  cabins 
with  the  first  work  of  their  axes,  and  therein 
they  placed  their  wives  and  little  ones,  and  estab- 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  53 

lished  homes,  each  man  for  himself,  yet  each  re- 
lying upon  his  neighbor  for  support  and  defence. 
And  these  homes  they  made  as  comfortable  as 
possible,  as  soon  as  possible.  And  this  trait  of 
the  Anglo-Saxons  and  Americans  has  not  escaped 
the  notice  of  M.  Demolins.^  *'  The  man,"  he  says, 
**  who  does  not  rely  any  more  upon  the  community, 
cares  less  for  the  outside  of  life  and  more  for  the 
hearth.  He  regards  the  hearth  as  the  true  citadel 
of  his  independence.  He  names  it,  and  defines  it 
by  a  word  that  is  untranslatable  [in  French]  in 
which  he  puts  all  his  soul — the  home."  Societies 
in  which  the  home  is  of  primary  importance  can 
not  be  said  to  be  particularistic,  or  if  it  be  so  said, 
their  particularism  is  not  of  the  individual,  but  of 
the  family. 

It  may  seem  to  be  exaggeration  to  say  that  the 
cause  of  the  present  low  state  of  public  spirit  in 
the  United  States  is  the  result  of  a  low  view  of 
the  marriage  bond,  but  history  tells  us  that  when 
there  has  been  a  low  view  of  marriage,  there  has 
been  a  low  view  of  public  duties  and  obligations. 
Certainly  when  divorces  are  granted  as  frequently 
as  they  are  in  the  various  states  of  the  union, 
there  must  result  a  tendency  that  will  weaken 
the  idea  of  authority  and  the  necessity  of  obe- 
dience. "There  is  abundant  evidence,"  says 
Westermarck,   "that    marriage    has,   upon   the 

»  {Id.  Liv.  II.,  Chap,  iv.,  p.  192.) 


54  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

whole,  become  more  durable  in  proportion  as  the 
human  race  has  risen  to  higher  degrees  of  culti- 
vation, and  that  a  certain  amount  of  civilization 
is  an  essential  condition  of  the  formation  of  life- 
long unions."^  The  modern  movement  in  the 
direction  of  promiscuous  marriages,  easy  sepa- 
rations and  temporary  relationships  is  a  dis- 
tinct reversion  to  barbaric  and  even  brutal  con- 
ditions ;  it  cannot  help  but  tend  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  vast  and  complex  work  of  society 
which  man  in  his  long  struggle  for  the  higher 
and  nobler  life  has  so  laboriously  built  up.  We 
must  understand  that  marriage  is  not  a  human 
contrivance.  It  is  a  divine  order,  and  it  runs 
back  to  the  very  beginning  of  creation.  It  is  in- 
deed the  law  of  life ;  not  only  of  the  animal  but 
also  of  the  vegetable  order  of  creation,  and  the 
higher  life  rises  in  the  scale  of  being,  the  nearer 
does  it  approach  to  both  monogyny  and  per- 
petuity. For  Christ  did  not  propound  a  new 
view  of  marriage ;  He  reaffirmed  the  old  and  un- 
changeable order.  God  in  the  beginning  created 
man  in  His  own  image — "  In  the  image  of  God 
created  He  him;  male  and  female  created  He 
them " ;  ^  and  when  He  blessed  them  and  sent 
them  forth  to  replenish  the  earth  and  subdue 
it.  He  sent  them  forth,  not  singly,  but  in  pairs, 

*  (History  of  Human  Marriage,  Chap,  xxiii.,  p.  535.) 
UGen.  i.  27,  R.  V.) 


TEE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  55 

as  two  yet  one,  as  a  family  and  as  society  in 
embryo.  All  history  shows  that  when  the 
family  has  been  strong  then  has  the  state  been 
strong,  and  that  when  the  family  has  been  weak, 
then  has  the  state  been  weak.  It  follows  in- 
evitably, that  the  dissolution  of  the  family  is  the 
dissolution  of  society,  and  that  the  state  directly 
reflects  society,  which  is  conditioned  by  the 
family  life. 

Marriage  is  the  one  institution  that  has  en- 
dured from  the  beginning  of  civilization  until 
now,  and  it  is  its  best  and  truest  touchstone.  As 
men  have  conducted  themselves  in  the  marital 
relation,  so  have  they  conducted  themselves  in 
the  social  life,  so  have  they  influenced  their  gov- 
ernments. We,  here  in  the  United  States,  who 
have  grown  out  of  conceit  with  our  state  legisla- 
tures, like  to  think  that  the  condition  of  govern- 
ment does  not  reflect  the  condition  of  social  life, 
but  we  veil  our  eyes  in  vain.  Government,  and 
by  government  now  I  mean  the  laws  that  estab- 
lish and  maintain  the  social  order,  is  the  mirror 
of  the  condition  of  society.  When  the  laws  are 
lax  and  uncertain  and  the  observance  of  them 
negligent  and  insufficient,  society  is  in  process  of 
decay.  When  they  are  firm  and  sure,  then  is 
the  observance  of  them  likewise  so,  and  society 
moves  on  to  better  and  nobler  ends.  A  health- 
ful development  of  society  is  always  desirable, 


56  TEE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

and  we  must  look  for  change  in  the  way  of  so- 
cial life.  It  is  only  the  unhealthful  development 
that  we  deplore,  and  the  development  cannot  be 
other  than  unhealthful  when  the  basis  of  the 
state  is  made  weak  and  dissoluble.  It  is  for  this 
reason  that  the  giving  of  suffrage  to  women  must 
be  viewed  with  alarm,  and  deplored.  There  is 
no  inequality  between  the  man  and  the  woman ; 
the  one  is  the  complement  of  the  other,  and 
neither  can  exist  alone  and  have  the  race  survive. 
But  the  giving  of  suffrage  to  women  means  an- 
other blow  aimed  at  the  stability  of  the  marriage 
relation.  It  has  a  tendency  to  divide  authority, 
and  thus  to  destroy  it.  As  the  suffrage  is  not  a 
natural  but  a  political  right,  the  better  way 
would  be  to  give  every  married  voter  an  addi- 
tional vote  in  right  of  his  wife.  The  married 
have,  as  a  rule,  far  greater  interest  in  the  stabil- 
ity of  the  community  than  the  unmarried.  It  is 
the  glory  of  the  Christian  Church  that  it  has 
ever  held  a  high  view  of  the  married  state,  and 
it  is  greatly  to  the  credit  of  the  Eoman  Catholic 
and  Protestant  Episcopal  churches  to-day  that 
they  stand,  as  they  have  stood  in  times  past,  for 
the  sanctity  of  marriage.  The  Eoman  Church, 
on  principle,  recognizes  no  dissolution  of  the  mar- 
riage tie  for  causes  arising  after  marriage ;  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  admits  that  for  the  cause 
of  adultery  alone  an  absolute  divorce  can  be  had, 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  57 

in  which  case  the  innocent  party  may  remarry 
again.  ^ 

After  all,  the  citizens  of  the  state  generally 
are  members  of  the  various  Christian  churches 
and  denominations.  Upon  them  rests  the  respon- 
sibility for  the  loose  views  of  marriage  that  pre- 
vail. It  seems  to  me  that  no  greater  thing  can 
be  done  for  the  good  of  society  than  to  convince 
the  various  members  of  the  various  Christian 
churches  and  sects  of  their  shortcomings  in  this 
regard.  It  is  hard,  of  course,  where  the  husband 
treats  his  wife  with  cruelty,  or  where  he  wilfully 
deserts  her,  to  say  to  the  woman,  you  must  re- 
main this  man's  wife  until  death  do  you  part ; 
but  if  there  were  no  possibility  of  divorce  there 
would  not  be  so  much  cruelty,  there  would  prob- 
ably be  fewer  desertions,  there  would  certainly 
be  fewer  improvident  marriages.  What  is 
wanted  is  a  law  to  prevent  all  marriages  until 
both  parties  are  of  the  age  of  twenty-one,  with- 
out the  consent  of  the  parents  of  both.  And  a 
law,  also,  putting  a  heavy  penalty  upon  the  man 
who  is  the  father  of  illegitimate  children  would 
likewise  be  useful;  men  would  probably  prefer 
to  have  legitimate  ones.     Marriage  ought  also  to 

'  There  is  a  strong  movement  on  foot  in  the  Episcopal  Church 
to  prohibit  a  remarriage  of  divorced  persons,  except  of  course  in 
the  case  where  parties  seeking  to  be  remarried  have  been  di- 
vorced from  one  another. 


58  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

legitimate  all  children  of  parents  born  before 
wedlock.     It  is  wrong  to  punish  the  innocent. 

But  our  laws  and  policies  will  be  useless  unless 
men  and  women  understand  that  marriage  is  not 
a  civil  relationship,  unless  they  are  persuaded 
that  it  is  a  sacrament,  or,  at  least,  that  it  is  sac- 
ramental in  character.  And  this  brings  us  to  a 
recognition  of  the  fact  that  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
great  teacher  of  morality,  and  that  He  laid  down 
the  principle  upon  which  marriage  is  based,  and 
upon  which  it  must  continue,  that  God  made 
man  two  yet  one ;  and  that  the  two  made  one 
cannot  dissever  the  marriage  bond  by  the  aid 
and  assistance  of  man.  Men  may  write  all  the 
rhetoric  they  please  in  regard  to  marriage,  they 
may  speak  of  its  ideal  beauty  and  perfection,  but 
they  will  convince  no  one,  not  even  themselves, 
of  its  sanctity  unless  they  believe  in  the  author- 
ity of  Jesus  Christ.  And,  strange  as  it  may 
seem  to  the  secular  mind,  those  who  believe  in 
Christ,  if  they  come  together  in  marriage,  are 
more  likely  to  live  in  peace  and  amity  together 
than  those  who  do  not.  For  they  see  God's  im- 
age in  their  companion  in  life  and  in  their  off- 
spring, and  they  endeavor  more  and  more  to 
conform  to  the  teachings  of  the  Son  of  God. 
Who  that  loves  Christ  and  who  that  loves  wife 
or  husband  will  think  of  the  trials  and  perplexi- 
ties of  married  life  ?    Will  they  not  rather  look 


THE  BASIS  OF  THE  STATE.  59 

upon  them  as  means  toward  the  development  of 
their  characters  ?  The  truth,  yes,  the  primary 
truth  of  a  great  many  marriages,  is  that  men  and 
women  enter  into  them  in  order  to  have  their 
own  way  more  effectually ;  but  this  is  impossi- 
ble. Marriage  is  the  surrender  of  self.  It  illus- 
trates constantly  our  Lord's  great  words :  "  Who- 
soever shall  lose  his  life  shall  preserve  it."  ^  It  is 
God's  way  of  neutralizing  the  inherent  selfishness 
of  the  individual.  It  is,  so  far  as  we  can  see  to- 
day, the  only  way  of  showing  men  what  should 
be  the  limit  of  aggressive  competition,  making 
the  world  perceive  that  the  final  establishment  of 
individualism  means  the  inevitable  destruction  of 
society  and  the  state.  Out  of  the  family  life  the 
state  arose,  upon  it  it  rests,  for  it  it  exists,  with 
its  decline  it  will  decay  and  fall  away. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  multiplica- 
tion of  divorces  is  the  direct  cause  of  the  decay 
of  society ;  it  is  a  symptom  rather  than  a  cause, 
and  to  this  conclusion  all  the  best  thinkers  have 
come.  It  is  therefore  the  family  that  must  be 
protected  and  made  strong,  and  the  family  life 
that  must  be  fostered  and  enlarged.  How  this 
is  to  be  done  exactly  it  is  difficult  to  say ;  but 
we  perceive  that  religion  must  do  its  work  and 
so  must  education.  Where  the  religion  of  Christ 
is  dominant,  there  a  high  view  of  the  family  life 

»(St.  Lukexvii.  33,  E.  V.) 


60  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

and  of  the  marital  relation  is  held,  and  men  and 
women  are  most  unwilling  to  dissolve  the  mar- 
riage bond.  But  the  teaching  of  Christ  does  not 
seem  to  be  sufficient  in  these  days  to  satisfy  the 
hearts  of  erring  men,  and  education  must  come 
in  to  its  aid  to  convince  their  minds.  And  this 
education  should  begin  with  the  child.  The  true 
function  of  the  home  should  be  dwelt  upon ;  the 
necessity  for  its  unity ;  its  worth  in  morality  and 
ethics ;  the  respective  places  of  the  man  and  the 
woman ;  the  value  of  the  sexes  in  relation  to  one 
another ;  the  dignity  of  motherhood,  and  the 
greatness  of  fatherhood. 

Jesus  Christ,  then,  we  must  understand,  made 
the  family  and  not  the  individual  the  social  unit, 
and  so  do  ancient  law  and  history  show  it  to  be. 
It  must  therefore  be  kept  intact,  or  society  will 
dissolve,  and  the  state  will  pass  on  to  lower 
and  ever  lower  forms  of  existence.  Upon  its 
preservation  hangs  the  whole  future  of  democ- 
racy and  the  progress  of  humanity.  Keligion 
and  education  have  a  mighty  task  to  perform. 


LECTUEE  II. 

THE  ANCIENT  STATE. 

Let  me  first  clear  the  ground  for  this  lecture 
by  stating  that  I  do  not  intend  to  examine  the 
history  and  structure  of  the  states  of  Egypt, 
Assyria  and  Persia ;  not  because  the  peoples  of 
these  states  have  had  no  influence  upon  the  de- 
velopment of  the  states  of  Europe  and  the  west, 
but  because  their  influence  has  been  too  remote 
to  be  precisely  traced,  and  because  it  was  never 
exerted  directly.  The  sources  of  development  of 
the  modern  state  are  found  in  the  history  and 
formation  of  the  Greek  and  Eoman  cities,  in  the 
institutions  and  character  of  the  Hindu  and 
Germanic  peoples,  and  in  the  settlement  and 
polity  of  the  Hebrews.  With  the  settlement  and 
polity  of  the  Hebrews  I  associate,  of  course,  the 
religions  that  we  have  obtained  from  them,  both 
the  Jewish  and  the  Christian. 

Too  little  attention  has,  it  seems  to  me,  been 
given  by  writers  to  the  civil  side  of  the  history 
of  the  Hebrews.  Because  all  the  acts  of  Israel 
have  in  their  history  some  religious  significance, 
students  have  in  their  examination  of  the  source 

61 


62  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

and  rise  of  the  development  of  civilization  and 
the  state,  ignored  the  evidences  that  they  afford 
of  the  ways  in  which  the  state  took  its  rise,  and 
progressed  on  to  articulated  sovereignty.  And 
it  has  been  on  this  account  that  for  many  gen- 
erations the  patriarchal  theory  was  discredited. 
Men  hesitated  to  believe  that  the  history  of 
Abraham  was  anything  other  than  an  exception 
to  the  general  ways  of  life  of  the  ancient  world, 
if  it  were  not  a  mere  legend  and  tradition  of  the 
Hebrews ;  but  Abraham's  story,  though  it  is  dif- 
ferent in  its  incidents  and  details,  presents  the 
same  points,  so  far  as  it  shows  the  way  how  the 
state  took  its  rise,  as  does  the  story  of  Job ;  and 
the  stories  of  these  two  patriarchs  are  paralleled 
by  that  of  the  return  of  the  Heraclidse  in  Grecian, 
and  of  the  adventures  of  ^neas  and  his  fol- 
lowers in  Koman,  history.  History  and  com- 
parative jurisprudence  herein  agree;  they  each 
assert  that  the  earliest  condition  of  the  human 
race  known  to  the  one  and  to  the  other  was 
patriarchal. 

Let  us  study  the  history  of  the  state  of  Israel. 
Where  does  it  begin  ?  In  the  power  of  Abraham 
over  his  own  family  and  household.  When 
Abraham  as  yet  dwelt  in  Ur,  in  the  land  of  the 
Chaldees,  he  was  under  the  authority  of  his 
father,  but  when  his  father  died  in  Haran,  and 
he  came  away  and  went  as  a  stranger  into  the 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  63 

land  of  Canaan,  he  and  his  wife,  and  Lot,  his 
nephew,  and  the  souls  they  had  gotten  in  Haran, 
with  the  substance  they  had  gathered,  he  became 
the  head  of  an  independent  and  autonomous 
state.  We  have  become  accustomed  to  think 
that  no  state  can  exist  without  legislative,  judi- 
cial, and  executive  powers  fully  articulated. 
These  powers  adhere  in  all  states  ex  necessitate^ 
but  it  has  not  always  been  necessary  to  define 
them.  In  the  ancient  state  they  were  united  in 
the  king  or  chief,  without  any  attempt  to  dis- 
criminate between  them,  indeed,  without  any 
thought  of  their  existence.  It  was  reserved  for 
the  modern  constitutional  state  to  analyze  its 
sovereignty,  and  to  declare  its  constituent  ele- 
ments. Yet  it  is  not  easy,  even  to-day,  when 
they  are  so  well  understood,  to  keep  them  de- 
fined. The  courts  constantly  legislate,  and  the 
legislative  power  frequently  executes  the  laws. 

We  perceive  that  Abraham,  when  we  examine 
his  history,  possessed  all  the  powers  of  govern- 
ment. He  decided  what  was  right  for  his  family, 
and  he  carried  his  decisions  into  effect.  And 
this  was  the  way  of  all  primitive  society.  It  was 
only  after  the  states  had  grown  and  their  mem- 
bers had  become  numerous,  whose  interests  had 
become  diversified,  that  it  became  necessary  to 
anticipate  differences  by  set  rules.  In  primitive 
times  the  chiefs  or  kings  decided  every  case  upon 


64  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

its  merits.  Their  judgments  did  not  rest  upon 
anything  which  we  can  call  law ;  for  the  earliest 
society  knew  nothing  of  law,  nor  did  it  have 
any  record  of  it.  Out  of  these  judgments  some 
principles  gradually  came  to  be  recognized,  and 
a  public  opinion  grew  up  that  demanded  that  the 
principles  recognized  here  and  there,  be  laid  down 
with  exactness.  Hence  arose  the  Codes  of  Solon 
and  Lycurgus,  the  law  of  the  Twelve  Tables  of 
Kome  and  of  the  Two  Tables  of  the  Hebrews. 
The  history  of  the  Hebrews  from  the  time  of 
Abraham  to  that  of  Moses  is  that  of  a  patriarchal 
state,  pure  and  simple.  Abraham,  Isaac,  Jacob, 
and  probably  Joseph  afterward,  ruled  in  every 
sense  of  the  word,  and  they  ruled  over  their  de- 
scendants and  brethren.  Hence  it  was  that  their 
rule  had  something  in  it  of  a  moral  and  constrain- 
ing power,  and  was  looked  upon  as  an  authority, 
and  the  attitude  of  their  subjects  was  one  of 
obedience  and  not  of  subjection. 

The  only  distinction  to  be  made  between  the 
rule  of  Abraham  and  the  Hebrew  patriarchs,  and 
the  other  kings  and  chieftains  of  the  ancient 
world,  is  this,  that  the  Hebrews  had  a  higher 
conception  of  the  Almighty  Godhead  than  the 
others ;  for  all  ancient  rulers,  so  far  as  we  know, 
rested  their  authority  upon  the  approval  of  their 
gods ;  and  all  of  them  claimed  to  be  descended 
from  gods  and  demigods.     But  this  distinction 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  65 

is  of  vast  importance,  and  has  been  full  of  mean- 
ing for  us,  who  have  received  our  religion  and 
so  many  of  our  social  and  political  ideas  from  the 
Hebrews.  Let  me  not  be  misunderstood :  it  is 
evident  that  the  Hebrews  at  first  looked  upon 
Jehovah  as  a  tribal  God,  though  as  greater  and 
more  powerful  than  all  other  gods ;  but  the  God 
of  the  Hebrews  was  not  a  deified  man :  He  was 
not  their  ancestor,  nor  the  ancestor  of  their  great 
father  Abraham,  but  his  God.  And  so  it  came 
about  naturally,  as  the  Hebrews  were  taught  by 
prophet  and  seer  more  and  more  concerning  the 
being  of  God,  that  they  understood  that  Jehovah 
was  the  creator  of  all  the  universe  and  the  father 
of  all  souls,  that  they  perceived,  however  dimly, 
that  all  men  are  of  one  universal  family.  The 
Greek,  too,  as  we  know,  had  arrived  at  this  same 
idea,  but  not  by  means  of  religion,  but  by  process 
of  thought.  Yet  the  Greek,  unlike  the  Hebrew, 
never  acted  upon  this  idea,  nor  did  he  bring  it  to 
its  logical  conclusion. 

The  speech  of  St.  Paul  on  Mars'  Hill  is  the 
greatest  one  that  has  ever  proceeded  out  of  the 
mouth  of  man,  those  of  the  Son  of  Man  alone 
excepted  :  "  The  God  that  made  the  world,  and 
all  things  therein.  He,  being  Lord  of  heaven  and 
earth,  dwelleth  not  in  temples  made  with  hands ; 
neither  is  He  served  by  men's  hands,  as  though 
He  needed  anything ;  seeing  He  Himself  giveth 


66  TEE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

to  all  life,  and  breath,  and  all  things ;  and  He 
made  of  one  every  nation  of  men  for  to  dwell  on 
all  the  face  of  the  earth,  having  determined  their 
appointed  seasons,  and  the  bounds  of  their  habi- 
tations ;  that  they  should  seek  God,  if  haply  they 
might  feel  after  Him,  and  find  Him,  though  He 
is  not  far  from  each  one  of  us :  for  in  Him  we 
live,  and  move,  and  have  our  being ;  as  certain 
even  of  your  own  poets  have  said.  For  we  are  also 
His  offspring."  ^  It  seems  strange  that  it  needed 
the  teachings  of  Christ  to  make  the  Jews  and  the 
world  generally  to  realize  and  understand  this 
great  truth,  when  the  story  they  had  of  the  crea- 
tion showed  them  the  unity  of  the  race,  and 
pointed  out  that  God,  though  He  were  a  Father 
to  men,  was  not  a  father  after  the  flesh. 

The  history  of  the  Israelites,  after  they  came 
to  the  land  of  Canaan,  followed  in  many  respects 
the  same  lines  that  the  histories  of  the  Greek  and 
Koman  peoples  did ;  indeed,  it  followed  the  same 
lines  as  those  of  the  ancient  peoples  generally. 
The  people  drove  out  the  old  inhabitants,  as  far 
as  they  were  able ;  then  they  took  the  land  into 
possession  and  divided  it  between  their  various 
tribes  and  families,  and  they  dwelt  in  cities  and 
villages,  the  near  to  the  near  of  kin.  What  the 
size  of  the  early  cities  of  Canaan  was,  we  do  not 
know,  but  it  is  evident  that  they  must  have  been 

i(Actsxvii.  24-29,  B.  V.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE,  67 

insignificant,  when  we  consider  their  great  num- 
ber. It  is  not  probable  that  they  were  any  thing- 
like  those  that  afterward  arose  to  greatness  in 
Greece  and  Italy  and  in  Palestine  itself.  Speak- 
ing of  the  genesis  of  the  City-State  of  the  Greeks 
and  Eomans,  Mr.  Fowler  says :  "  A  vast  amount 
of  research  has  of  late  years  been  made  and  pub- 
lished on  this  subject ;  and  the  chief  result  of  it 
which  concerns  us  here  has  been  to  show  (1)  that 
before  the  final  settlement  on  the  land  takes 
place,  the  main  stock  is  always  found  to  consist 
of  groups  or  cells,  held  together  by  the  tie  of 
Kinship  ;  (2)  that  after  the  settlement  has  taken 
place,  these  groups  or  cells  are  still  found,  but 
now  fixed  upon  the  land  in  forms  which  may 
roughly  be  described  as  village  communities y  con- 
sisting of  a  number  of  families  united  together."  ^ 
Mr.  Fowler  does  not  undertake  to  show  what  it 
is  that  holds  these  kinsfolk  together,  but  M.  Fustel 
de  Coulanges  proves  conclusively  that  it  is  reli- 
gion, the  religion  of  the  family  and  of  the  gens 
and  of  the  tribe.  "  An  excellent  picture  of  the 
way  in  which  these  local  groups  may  be  supposed 
to  have  come  into  existence  is  supplied  by  Sir 
Henry  Maine  in  one  of  his  most  valuable  lectures 
on  these  subjects.  He  quotes  the  words  of  an 
Indian  poetess,  describing  the  immigration  of  a 
people  called  the  Yellalee,  into  that  part  of  India 

»  (The  City-state,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  28.) 


68  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

which  was  once  famous  as  Arcot.  *  The  poetess 
compares  the  invasion  to  the  flowing  of  the  juice 
of  the  sugar  cane  over  a  flat  surface.  The  juice 
crystallizes,  and  the  crystals  are  the  various  village 
communities.  In  the  middle  is  one  lump  of  par- 
ticularly fine  sugar,  the  place  where  is  the  temple 
of  the  god.  Homely  as  the  image  is,  it  seems  in 
one  respect  peculiarly  felicitous.  It  represents 
the  tribe,  though  moving  in  a  fused  mass  of  men, 
as  containing  within  itself  a  principle  of  coal- 
escence which  began  to  work  as  soon  as  the  move- 
ment was  over.'  We  cannot,  of  course,  be  sure 
that  such  an  image  as  this  would  exactly  represent 
the  way  in  which  Greeks  and  Latins,  or  Celts  and 
Teutons,  settled  down  on  the  lands  which  they 
conquered ;  for  the  history  of  man,  as  of  plants 
and  animals,  presents  local  variation  everywhere. 
But  I  know  of  no  better  way  of  getting  a  general 
idea  of  what  we  suppose  to  have  happened  at  this 
momentous  era  in  the  progress  of  a  people,  than 
by  laying  to  heart  this  singularly  happy  illustra- 
tion." ' 

The  first  great  characteristic  of  these  early  vil- 
lage communities  was  kinship  ;  this  is  shown  con- 
clusively by  Maine  and  Fowler  and  de  Coulanges, 
indeed,  by  all  who  have  written  on  the  origin  of 
civil  society.  And  this  we  see  likewise  to  be  the 
case  when  we  read  the  history  of  the  settlement 

»  {Id.,  pp.  29,  30.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  69 

of  Israel  in  the  books  of  Joshua  and  Judges.  It 
is  hardly  necessary  for  me  to  undertake  to  show 
how  these  communities  came  together  in  various 
groups  and  founded  great  and  famous  cities,  but 
it  is  probable  that  there  was  in  some  community, 
or  group  of  communities,  a  leading  family  in 
whose  veins  the  blood  of  a  common  ancestor  was 
supposed  to  run  the  purest.  From  the  members 
of  this  family  a  leader  would,  as  a  rule,  be  chosen 
for  some  military  expedition,  whose  authority,  if 
he  were  successful,  would  be  augmented,  and  he 
would  have  a  larger  share  of  the  land  appropri- 
ated from  the  conquered  village  societies ;  and 
thus  he  would  become  powerful  and  be  elevated 
eventually  to  the  place  of  chief  or  king. 

Of  the  rise  of  the  city-states  of  Athens  and  of 
Kome,  as  well  as  of  Jerusalem,  we  have  accurate 
historical  accounts.  But  we  must  always  under- 
stand that  behind  the  city-states  of  the  classic 
peoples  there  is  an  older  civilization,  the  same  as 
there  is  behind  the  Holy  City  of  the  Jews.  It  is 
of  the  older  and  original  civilization  that  Sir 
Henry  Maine  treats  generally,  that  is,  of  the 
state  of  life  of  which  we  have  glimpses  in  the 
books  of  Joshua  and  of  Judges.  Let  us  see  how 
the  City-State  of  Athens  arose  ;  we  have  an  ac- 
count of  it  by  Thucydides,  which  scholars  ac- 
cept as  generally  true.  He  says  ^  "  In  the  days 
»(ii.  15.) 


70  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  Cecrops  and  the  first  kings  down  to  the  reign 
of  Theseus,  Attica  was  divided  into  communes, 
having  their  own  town  halls  and  magistrates. 
Except  in  case  of  alarm,  the  whole  people  did 
not  assemble  in  council  under  the  king,  but  ad- 
ministered their  own  affairs,  and  advised  together 
in  their  several  townships.  Some  of  them  at 
times  even  went  to  war  with  him,  as  the  Eleu- 
sinians  under  Eumolpus  with  Erectheus.  But 
when  Theseus  came  to  the  throne,  he,  being  a 
powerful  as  well  as  a  wise  ruler,  among  other 
improvements  in  the  administration  of  the  coun- 
try, dissolved  the  councils  and  separate  govern- 
ments, and  united  all  the  inhabitants  of  Attica 
in  the  present  city,  establishing  one  council  and 
town  hall.  They  continued  to  live  on  their  own 
lands,  but  he  compelled  them  to  resort  to  Athens 
as  their  metropolis,  and  henceforward  they  were 
all  inscribed  on  the  rolls  of  her  citizens.  A  great 
city  thus  arose,  which  was  handed  down  by 
Theseus  to  his  descendants,  and  from  his  day 
to  this  the  Athenians  have  regularly  celebrated 
the  national  festival  of  the  Synoecia,  or  *  union 
of  the  communes,'  in  honor  of  the  Goddess 
Athene."^ 

The  genesis  of  Rome  was  different  in  detail, 
and  yet  it  manifests  the  same  general  features  as 
that  of  Athens.     We  know  from  historical  re- 

*  ( Jowett's  Thucydides,  p.  104,  Am.  Edition. ) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  71 

search  and  a  study  of  the  laws  of  Kome,  that  the 
family  was  the  unit  and  centre  of  all  society  and 
government.  We  perceive,  too,  that  the  various 
families  were  associated  together  in  different 
groups,  called  gens.  How  the  different  families 
grew  and  developed  into  the  various  gentes,  it  is 
impossible  to  tell  exactly,  we  can  only  imagine. 
A  family,  of  course,  at  the  beginning,  had  but 
one  trunk  or  branch,  and  the  other  and  younger 
branches  gathered  around  it  later  on,  some  nat- 
urally, and  some  by  adoption.  De  Coulanges 
says:  "The  Aryan  race  appears  to  have  been 
composed  of  an  indefinite  number  of  societies  of 
this  nature,  during  a  long  succession  of  ages. 
These  thousands  of  little  groups  lived  isolated, 
having  little  to  do  with  each  other,  having  no 
need  of  one  another,  united  by  no  bond  religious 
or  political,  having  each  its  own  domain,  each  its 
internal  government,  each  its  gods."^ 

It  was  religion  which  held  the  family  together ; 
it  was  religion  which  held  the  gens^  it  was  re- 
ligion which  held  the  city.  Each  family  had  its 
own  special  divinities,  its  Penates,  and  its  ances- 
tors. Each  gens  had  its  gods  or  demigods,  each 
city  its  protecting  divinities.  A  curious  story  is 
related  to  show  the  strong  hold  that  the  worship 
of  the  ge7is  had  upon  the  Eoman  people,  of  Fa- 
bius,  who  was  called  "  the  shield  of  Kome."    It 

'  (The  Ancient  City,  Book  II.,  Chap,  x.,  p.  153.) 


72  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

was  during  the  second  Punic  war,  and  Fabius 
was  making  head  against  Hannibal.  Certainly 
it  does  seem  that  it  was  of  first  importance  that 
he  should  remain  with  his  army ;  but  he  left  it 
in  the  hands  of  an  imprudent  and  incompetent 
lieutenant  and  went  to  Eome,  because  the  anni- 
versary of  the  sacrifice  of  his  gens  had  arrived, 
and  it  was  his  duty  to  perform  the  sacred  act. 
The  gods  of  the  various  cities  were  legion. 
There  were  first  the  gods  that  were  of  the  same 
nature  as  those  of  the  primitive  religion  of  the 
family — Lares,  Penates,  Genii,  Demons,  Heroes. 
Then  there  were  the  gods  of  other  species,  like 
Jupiter,  Juno  and  Minerva,  toward  whom  the 
aspect  of  nature  had  directed  the  thoughts  of  men. 
Then  there  were  the  city  gods  who  lived  within 
the  walls  of  the  various  city-states.  Xenophon 
says  that  Athens  had  more  religious  festivals  than 
any  other  Grecian  city.  The  whole  territory  of 
Attica  was  covered  with  temples  and  chapels. 
It  is  well  known  that  Rome  brought  home  the 
conquered  gods  of  the  cities  that  she  subdued. 
And  strange  to  say,  law  itself  developed  out  of 
religion  and  religious  observances.  And  this  de- 
velopment of  law  we  find  among  the  Greeks  and 
the  Eomans  and  the  Hebrews  alike.  It  was  the 
kings  who  were  the  judges  in  the  earliest  times, 
and  when  a  king  decided  a  dispute  by  a  sentence, 
his  judgment  was  assumed  to  be  the  result  of 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  73 

direct  inspiration.  "  It  is  the  king,"  says  Grote, 
"who  is  the  grand  personal  mover  of  Grecian 
heroic  society.  He  is  on  earth  the  equivalent  of 
Zeus  in  the  agora  of  the  gods ;  the  supreme  God 
of  Olympus  is  in  the  habit  of  carrying  on  his 
government  with  frequent  publicity ;  of  hearing 
some  dissentient  opinions,  and  of  allowing  him- 
self to  be  wheedled  by  Aphrodite,  or  worried 
into  compliance  by  Here ;  but  his  determination 
is  at  last  conclusive,  subject  only  to  the  overrul- 
ing interference  of  the  Moerae  or  Fates."  ^  What 
the  king  decides  is  what  Zeus  decides,  and  Zeus  is 
not  so  much  a  lawgiver  as  he  is  a  judge.  The 
Hebrews  we  observe  were  for  a  long  time  gov- 
erned by  judges,  raised  up  directly  by  God,  and 
inspired  by  Him  to  speak  right  judgments. 

And  so,  when  the  families  and  gentes  who  lived 
in  various  small  communities  came  together  to 
build  the  city  of  Eome,  they  laid  the  foundation 
thereof  with  religious  observances.  It  is  probable 
that  they  erected  first  some  fortified  place  of  ref- 
uge, which  served  also  as  a  centre  of  worship  and 
traffic.  Each  citadel  in  Latium,  and  probably 
in  all  Italy,  was  common,  so  far  as  we  can 
learn,  to  several  village  communities,  and  was 
the  object  of  special  religious  observances, 
both  in  its  foundation  and  in  its  maintenance,  a 
fact  which  became  the  source  of  the  legend  of 

'  (History  of  Greece,  Vol.  II.,  Part  I.,  Chap,  xx.,  p.  74.) 


74  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  building  of  Rome  by  Romulus.  There  can 
be  very  little  doubt  that  originally,  and  in  the 
very  early  period,  the  Latin  people  were  grouped 
together  in  clusters  of  village  communities,  each 
possessing  a  citadel,  which  was  the  centre  of  a 
common  worship,  probably  that  which  afterward 
became  the  worship  of  the  various  gentes.  The 
whole  Latin  race  had  a  common  political  centre 
and  a  common  worship  on  the  Alban  Hill,  where 
Jupiter  Latiaris  was  revered.  One  of  the  groups 
of  these  communities,  which  participated  in  his 
worship,  had  occupied  as  its  citadel  a  square  hill 
some  one  hundred  and  sixty  feet  above  the  level 
of  the  sea,  whose  rocky  sides  fell  precipitously  to 
the  south  bank  of  the  Tiber,  Three  different 
communities  seem  originally  to  have  had  their 
residence,  as  well  as  their  refuge,  on  this  hill, 
while  their  farms  lay  around  it ;  these  three  old- 
est settlements  of  Rome  were  the  Cermalus,  the 
Yelia  and  the  Palatium.  The  whole  hill  came 
eventually  to  be  called  the  Palatine  Hill ;  its 
natural  strength  was  increased  by  massive  walls, 
and  its  position,  as  commanding  the  Tiber  and 
the  outposts  of  the  Latin  people  toward  Etruria, 
marked  it  out  for  future  greatness.^ 

Of  the  origin  of  Jerusalem,  which  eventually  be- 
came the  city-state  of  the  Jews,  absorbing  all  the 
life  and  strength  of  Judea,  we  have  an  exact  and 

>  (The  City-state,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  54.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  75 

accurate  account.  The  Israelites,  it  must  be  re- 
membered, had  no  proper  family  worship  apart 
from  Jehovah  at  the  place  where  the  tabernacle 
was  pitched,  or  apart  from  the  temple  afterward 
founded  at  Jerusalem.  And  they  had  no  tribal 
worship  except  as  they  set  up  the  same  unlawfully. 
We  know,  of  course,  that  the  history  of  the  Israel- 
ites from  the  time  of  Moses  to  that  of  Ezra,  is  that 
of  apostasy  after  apostasy  from  the  worship  of  Je- 
hovah ;  but  these  fallings  away  of  Israel  were  not 
to  worship,as  far  as  we  can  learn,the  manes  of  their 
ancestors  and  the  heroes  of  their  tribes,  but  rather 
the  gods  many  and  the  lords  many  of  their  neigh- 
bors. It  is  probable  that  the  principal  reason 
why  the  Israelites  were  prone  to  idolatry  was 
because  the  worship  of  these  divinities  was  so  at- 
tractive, by  reason  of  the  sensual  pleasures  they 
afforded.  The  counsel  that  Balaam  gave,  by  which 
the  Israelites  were  so  easily  led  to  commit  tres- 
pass against  the  Lord,  in  the  matter  of  Baal-peor, 
showed  the  drift  of  their  evil  inclinations  from 
first  to  last.  Let  me  say  that  I  know  of  no  his- 
tory that  is  more  full  of  sadness  than  that  of  the 
Hebrews,  as  set  forth  in  the  book  of  Judges,  dur- 
ing those  evil  days  when  "there  was  no  king 
in  Israel ;  every  man  did  that  which  was  right 
in  his  own  eyes."  ^  The  story  of  the  invasions 
and  insurrections  and  evil  doings,  and  of  the 

*  (Chap.  xxi.  25,  K.  v.) 


76  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

quarrelings  and  murderings  and  killings,  makes 
us  feel  that  mankind  in  the  beginning  of  the 
formation  of  society  was  not  much  raised  above 
the  level  of  the  brutes. 

There  is  this  difference  to  be  noted  between 
the  early  history  of  Israel  and  that  of  the  gentile 
nations  by  whom  they  were  surrounded,  and  that 
is,  that,  whereas,  the  Israelites  in  the  beginning 
had  no  kings,  these  had  many.  And  this  differ- 
ence we  perceive  when  we  study  the  early  history 
of  Greece  and  of  Italy.  Every  chief  is  called  a 
king,  and  so  is  often  the  head  of  a  family  and 
tribe.  Another  difference  is  this,  that  the  kings 
of  the  Canaanites  and  the  Greeks  and  Latins  had 
the  power  or  right  to  sacrifice.  Homer  and 
Yirgil  represent  the  kings  as  continually  occu- 
pied with  sacred  ceremonies.  Demosthenes  tells 
us  that  the  ancient  kings  of  Athens  performed 
themselves  all  the  sacrifices  that  were  prescribed 
by  the  religion  of  that  city.  And  Xenephon  says 
that  the  kings  of  Sparta  were  the  chiefs  of  the 
Lacedaemonean  religion.  And  the  same  was 
true  of  the  Eoman  kings.  They  were  king- 
priests,  and  were  always  inaugurated  with  re- 
ligious ceremonies.  The  second  king,  Numa, 
Livy  tells  us,  fulfilled  the  greater  part  of  the  re- 
ligious functions  of  the  city-state,  but  as  he  fore- 
saw that  his  successors,  having  often  wars  to 
maintain,  would  not  always  be  able  to  care  for 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  77 

the  sacrifices,  he  instituted  the  diamines  to  replace 
the  kings,  when  the  latter  should  be  absent  from 
Kome. 

In  Israel  the  right  to  sacrifice  and  to  care  for 
the  things  of  religion  were  confined  to  the  family 
of  Aaron,  assisted  by  the  whole  tribe  of  Levi, 
which  were,  as  it  is  written,  "set  before  Aaron, 
the  priest,  that  they  might  minister  unto  him."  ^ 
Aaron  was  made  the  High-Priest,  and  his  sons  the 
common  priests.  After  Aaron  h  is  son  Eleazar,  and 
after  Eleazar,  one  of  his  descendants,  from  genera- 
tion to  generation,  succeeded  him  in  this  great  of- 
fice. It  seems  strange,  at  first  sight,  that  the 
High-Priests  of  Israel  never  became  kings  until 
the  days  of  the  Maccabees.  But  a  little  reflec- 
tion, however,  will  show  us  why.  Jehovah  was  at 
first  regarded  as  the  king  of  the  Hebrews,  and 
the  priests  who  ministered  before  Him  did  not 
dare  to  usurp  the  civil  authority.  The  gods  of 
the  Greeks  and  the  Eomans,  on  the  other  hand, 
were  never  considered  to  be  the  rulers  of  the 
people,  but  only  divinities  whose  anger  was  to  be 
appeased  and  whose  appetites  were  to  be  satis- 
fied. And  so  the  laws  of  the  Greeks  and  the 
Komans  in  the  beginning  were  not  considered  to 
be  based  so  much  upon  the  principles  of  right 
and  wrong,  but  rather  upon  expediency  and  cus- 
tom.    But  the  laws  of  the  Hebrews  were  held  to 

'  (Num.  iii.  6,  R.  v.) 


78  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

be  based  upon  the  eternal  principles  of  justice,  to 
have  come,  as  it  were,  by  direct  revelation  from 
the  fountain-head  of  truth. 

It  was  because  the  people  grew  weary  of  the 
rule  of  a  moral  governor,  as  expressed  in  moral 
ordinances  and  statutes,  that  they  desired  to  have 
a  king  to  rule  over  them  like  all  the  other  nations, 
and  though  Samuel,  the  judge,  to  whom  they 
applied,  foretold  what  would  be  the  manner  of 
their  king,  that  he  would  oppress  and  afflict  them 
and  treat  them  unjustly  and  bring  them  into 
servitude,  they  yet  refused  to  obey  his  voice  and 
would  have  a  king  to  judge  them  and  to  go  be- 
fore them  to  fight  their  battles,  like  the  nations 
of  the  gentiles.  It  was  not  a  man  of  a  leading 
tribe,  nor  yet  of  a  leading  family,  that  was  taken 
first  by  Samuel  to  be  king  over  Israel,  but  rather 
was  it,  "  a  young  man  and  a  goodly ; "  one,  "  who 
from  his  shoulders  and  upward  was  higher 
than  any  of  the  people."^  How  it  was  that 
Saul  and  his  family  were  set  aside,  and  David 
and  his  family  were  preferred  in  their  stead,  it 
is  not  necessary  to  relate  ;  but  it  is  worth  our 
consideration  to  note  that,  although  the  tribe 
of  Judah,  to  which  David  belonged,  was  a  great 
and  strong  tribe,  and  his  family  was  what  may 
be  called  a  leading  one,  yet  there  was  nothing  in 
the  outward  condition  of  his  father,  Jesse,  that 

'(1  Sam.  ix.  2.  K.  v.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  79 

would  lead  Samuel  to  select  David  to  be  the  king 
of  Israel,  and  to  displace  the  obstinate  and  re- 
bellious Saul.  The  kings  of  Judah  and  Israel  did 
not  become  such  by  reason  of  any  imaginary  de- 
scent from  some  tribal  hero  or  demigod,  nor  yet 
were  they  elevated  to  their  high  position  by  the 
people,  like  the  tyrants  of  Greece  and  of  Italy,  in 
order  to  make  head  against  an  oppressive  aris- 
tocracy or  oligarchy,  said  to  be  descended  from 
such  heroes  and  gods.  The  kings  of  Israel,  or,  at 
any  rate,  the  first  kings,  became  such  by  the  will 
of  God  as  expressed  by  His  prophets  and  seers. 
But  the  kings  of  Judah  and  Israel  had  not  the 
poAver  or  right  of  sacrifice.  Church  and  state,  if 
we  may  so  speak,  religion  and  civil  rule,  were 
divorced  in  the  very  beginning  of  Jewish  history. 
They  were  to  support  and  supplement  one  an- 
other, but  they  were  not  to  be  crossed  and  con- 
fused. We  think  this  a  modern  principle  or  idea," 
to  which  we  have  come  through  many  genera- 
tions of  struggle  and  tribulation,  but  it  is  as  old 
as  the  kings  of  the  Hebrews. 

How  the  city  of  Jerusalem  arose  to  prominence 
and  became  the  centre  of  the  life  of  the  Jews,  we 
have,  as  I  have  said,  an  accurate  account.  Jeru- 
salem, which  was  a  city  of  the  Jebusites,  was 
situated  on  the  border  between  the  tribes  of 
Benjamin  and  Judah.  It  consisted  of  an  upper 
and  a  lower  city,  and  although  the  lower  city  had 


80  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

been  taken  by  the  tribes  of  Judah  and  Simeon 
when  they  commenced  their  task  of  taking  into 
possession  the  land  allotted  to  them,  and  after- 
ward by  the  Benjaminites  ;  the  upper  city  re- 
mained secure  in  the  possession  of  the  Jebusites 
until  the  time  of  David.  It  was  after  the  death 
of  Saul,  and  the  reunion  of  the  elders  and  the 
warriors  of  the  various  tribes  under  David  at 
Hebron,  that  David  and  all  Israel  proceeded  to 
Jerusalem  and  laid  siege  to  it,  and  took  it.  David 
immediately  began  to  secure  himself  in  his  new 
acquisition.  He  enclosed  the  whole  city  with  a 
wall  and  connected  it  with  a  citadel.  In  this 
latter  place  he  took  up  his  own  quarters,  and  the 
Zion  of  the  Jebusites  became  the  city  of  David. 
But  it  was  the  arrival  of  the  Ark,  the  sacred  de- 
pository of  religion,  that  gave  to  the  city  its  chief 
importance.  The  old  tabernacle,  being  now 
pitched  on  the  height  of  Gibeon,  a  new  tent  was 
spread  on  the  fortress  for  the  reception  of  the 
Ark,  and  here  "in  its  place,"  it  was  deposited 
with  the  most  impressive  ceremonies,  and  Zion 
became  at  once  the  sanctuary  as  well  as  the  cit- 
adel of  the  nation.  It  was,  then,  by  reason  of 
two  things  that  Jerusalem  became  so  famous  and 
important  and  the  centre  of  the  national  life  of 
the  Hebrews,  first,  because  of  its  strong  and  ad- 
vantageous position ;  secondly,  because  it  became 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  81 

the  depository  of  the  Ark,  the  place  where  the 
temple  was  afterward  built. 

How  it  became  the  city  of  the  whole  people, 
and  not  simply  of  Judah  and  Benjamin,  we  un- 
derstand when  we  consider  that  the  Hebrews 
worshipped  not  the  manes  of  their  ancestors,  nor 
any  tribal  gods,  but  Jehovah,  the  self -existing  One, 
the  Lord  God  Almighty ;  and  that  their  priests 
had  not  been  selected  from  the  people  by  reason 
of  priority  of  birth,  or  of  any  other  fancied  superi- 
ority, but  by  the  will  of  God  Himself ;  as  were  also 
their  kings.  It  was  because  of  these  great  facts 
that  there  was  no  difference  between  man  and 
man,  family  and  family,  or  tribe  and  tribe,  among 
the  Jews,  that  they  were  all  governed  by  the 
same  laws  and  subject  to  the  same  obligations, 
that  the  family  idea  prevailed  so  strongly  among 
them,  and  that  the  principles  of  government  for 
the  family  became  the  principles  of  government 
for  the  nation.  The  family,  as  we  have  seen,  was 
the  basis  of  society  among  the  Greeks  and  Ko- 
mans,  the  origin  of  the  state,  as  Aristotle  shows ; 
but,  let  us  observe,  because  the  family  gods  of 
the  classical  nations  were  so  small  and  so  many, 
the  city-states  of  the  Greeks  and  Eomans  speedily 
outgrew  the  family  idea ;  while  in  Israel  the  fam- 
ily idea  grew  and  expanded  and  took  in  all  the 
nation.  The  cities  of  the  Greeks  and  Eomans 
were  federations,  as  it  were,  of  families  and  gentes 


82  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH, 

and  tribes,  while  the  city  of  the  Jews  was  an  ex- 
tension of  one  family,  that  of  Abraham,  Isaac 
and  Jacob.  Families  in  Greece  and  Kome  which 
had  not  been  so  fortunate  as  to  join  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  this  or  that  city,  had  to  push  their 
way  in  by  many  acts  of  violence ;  but  when  the 
city  of  the  Jews  was  established,  it  extended  it- 
self to  all  the  families  of  the  nation  at  once. 
Jerusalem  became  the  centre  of  a  family  life,  and 
it  possessed  this  great  feature  to  the  end,  in  spite 
of  the  separated  kingdoms  of  Judah  and  Israel. 
Of  course,  here  and  there,  there  were  prominent 
men  and  leading  families,  but  no  men,  or  family 
of  men,  among  the  Israelites  ever  esteemed  their 
brethren  of  less  importance  or  dignity  in  the  sight 
of  Jehovah  than  they  esteemed  themselves;  all 
regarded  all  as  brethren. 

It  was  for  this  reason  that  among  the  Hebrews 
the  state  manifested  in  its  life  that  order  which 
we  have  learned  to  call  the  social  order,  a  state 
where  regard  is  not  had  simply  for  hard  and  fast 
rules  of  law,  which  had  become  crystallized 
through  practice  and  submission,  but  where  re- 
gard is  had  for  what  is  essentially  right  and  in- 
herently wrong,  looking  upon  men  as  equal  and 
as  members  of  one  great  family.  "We  are  apt  to 
regard  socialism  as  a  new  thing,  but  though  the 
word  itself  is  new,  in  its  essence  it  is  as  old  as 
the  law  of  Moses.     The  reason  why  people  gen- 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  83 

erall}^  think  of  socialism  as  new  is  because  of  the 
change  that  industrial  life  has  made  in  the  meth- 
ods and  manners  of  men,  and  because  of  the 
changed  way  of  the  modern  production  of  wealth 
and  of  its  accumulation.  The  aim  of  socialism 
has  ever  been  the  same  from  its  inception :  a 
more  even  distribution  of  the  wealth  of  the  period, 
or  of  money  or  of  money's  worth,  as  a  means  of 
human  happiness.  The  agitation  of  socialism,  in 
the  sense  of  a  struggle  for  greater  equality,  be- 
gan in  the  state  immediately  after  the  termina- 
tion of  the  period  of  patriarchal  society,  and  we 
find  this  to  be  the  case  in  Greece  and  Eome  as 
well  as  among  the  Hebrews. 

We  cannot  say  that  the  patriarchal  period  had 
ended  when  Moses  became  the  leader  of  the  He- 
brews, but  it  was  coming  to  an  end,  and  the  laws 
he  promulgated  were  anticipatory  of  a  state 
wherein  the  claims  of  the  family,  pure  and  simple, 
must  not  be  ignored.  This  we  must  always  re- 
member of  the  Mosaic  dispensation ;  the  socialism 
of  Moses  was  based  upon  the  family  idea.  The  aim 
of  Moses  was,  as  we  can  clearly  see,  to  prevent  by 
wise  institutions  great  inequality  among  the  He- 
brews, preserving  at  the  same  time  private  prop- 
erty and  inheritance.  "  We  find,"  says  Graham,' 
"  in  Leviticus  a  system  of  land-holding  intended 
to  secure  reasonable   equality,   and  a  very  re- 

'  (Socialism  New  and  Old,  Chap,  ii.,  pp.  22,  23.) 


W4  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

markable  institution,  the  Jubilee,  designed  to 
prevent  the  Jewish  people  from  being  perma- 
nently divorced  from  the  land.  We  have  un- 
usual clemency  shown  to  the  honest  debtor,  by 
which  the  purpose  of  a  good  Bankruptcy  Law 
was  effected ;  and  a  special  provision  for  the  poor, 
if  any  such  should  appear  under  a  general  social- 
istic polity,  expressly  designed  to  prevent  extreme 
poverty.  The  usurer  as  an  evil  possibility  is  fore- 
seen by  Moses,  and  is  warned  from  exercising  his 
function,  or  practicing  his  methods,  at  the  cost  of 
his  brethren  in  their  necessities.  We  find  equal- 
ity aimed  at,  and  fraternity  everywhere  incul- 
cated as  the  surest  moral  guarantee  of  equality. 
But  all  this  is  of  the  essence  of  Socialism.  More- 
over, it  is  State  Socialism  or  Socialism  embodied 
in  fundamental  institutions,  and  under  the  con- 
secration and  guardianship  of  Law ;  and  it  had 
the  further  consecration  of  Keligion,  which  was 
in  the  beginning  inseparably  connected  with 
Law." 

We  know  that  the  socialism  of  Israel  failed. 
Individualism,  that  is  selfism,  the  curse  of  society 
ancient  and  modern,  gradually  asserted  itself,  and 
gross  inequality  of  condition  came  into  existence, 
and  the  rich  began  to  oppress  the  poor.  But  the 
laws  of  Moses  acted  as  a  determent  and  clog,  and 
made  the  change  from  socialism  to  individualism 
slow,  and  a  return  to  the  family  idea  always  pos- 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  85 

sible.  Hence  arose  the  prophets,  who  denounced 
the  proud  and  the  rich  continually.  All  the 
prophets  were  socialists,  and  Isaiah,  the  greatest 
of  the  prophets,  was  the  greatest  socialist  of  them 
all.  "  Woe  unto  them  that  join  house  to  house, 
that  lay  field  to  field,  till  there  be  no  room,  and 
ye  be  made  to  dwell  alone  in  the  midst  of  the 
land,"  ^  said  this  great  teacher.  It  was  the  in- 
crease of  the  importance,  and  of  the  riches  of 
the  few  at  the  expense  of  the  many  that  brought 
so  many  evils  upon  the  land.  Israel  is  ex- 
horted again  and  again  to  return  to  the  days 
of  simplicity  and  righteous  living.  "  Let  the 
wicked  forsake  his  way,  and  the  unrighteous  man 
his  thoughts :  and  let  him  return  unto  the  Lord, 
and  He  will  have  mercy  upon  him ;  and  to  our 
God,  for  He  will  abundantly  pardon."  ^  At  the 
time  when  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  born,  the  social- 
istic features  of  the  Jewish  commonwealth  had 
practically  disappeared.  Men  no  longer  felt  the 
strong  impress  of  the  family  life,^  and  the  central 
idea  that  the  descendants  of  Abraham,  Isaac  and 
Jacob  were  practically  one  family,  and  that  each 
one's  prosperity  was  the  prosperity  of  all,  and  each 
one's  adversity  the  adversity  of  all,  had  disap- 
peared. The  city  and  commonwealth  of  the  Jews 
were  ripe  for  the  destruction  which  very  soon, 
after  the  death  of  Christ,  came  upon  them. 

'  (v.  8,  R.  V.)      2  {Id.,  LV.  7,  R.  V.)      3  (St.  Mark  vii.  11.) 


86  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

It  seems  unnecessary  for  me  to  speak  of  the 
decline  and  fall  of  Athens  and  of  the  Grecian 
cities,  and  much  less  of  the  great  Latin  city  of 
Kome.  The  history  of  their  decline  is  known  to 
all.  The  Greek  city  reached  in  Athens,  under 
Pericles,  a  perfection  of  civic  life  that  was  won- 
derful, and  that  bade  fair  to  be  enduring,  and 
yet  it  speedily  passed  away  The  trouble  with 
Athens,  and  the  Grecian  cities  generally,  lay  in 
the  inelasticity  of  their  citizenship,  and  the  fact 
that  there  was  always  to  be  found  in  them  the 
unprivileged  many  making  war  against  the 
privileged  few,  demanding  rights  and  powers 
which  the  few  would  yield  only  because  of  force. 
The  war  of  the  dr^fio^  against  the  eupatrids  con- 
tinued from  the  time  of  the  overthrow  of  the 
earliest  monarchies  to  the  da3^s  of  the  Koman 
conquest.  Sometimes  the  people  pushed  in  and 
acquired  rights  and  privileges,  but  more  often 
they  were  shut  out  and  acquired  none.  But  when 
they  did  acquire  full  rights  with  the  aristocracy 
there  was  always  another  class,  of  aliens  and 
f  reedmen  and  outlaws,  outside,  demanding  recog- 
nition and  a  share  of  political  power.  Hence  it 
was  that  factions  were  continually  arising  in  the 
Grecian  states,  consisting  of  the  few,  the  rich, 
the  well-born,  and  the  good,  as  they  loved  to  call 
themselves ;  and  these  were  at  an  endless  feud 
with  the  many,  the  poor,  the  base,  and  the  low- 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  87 

born,  as  their  enemies  loved  to  style  them.  It  is 
impossible  here  to  relate  the  many  struggles  that 
took  place  between  the  few  and  the  many,  the 
oligarchies  and  the  democracies,  of  the  Grecian 
cities.  They  were  as  numerous  as  the  private 
wars  that  arose  in  mediseval  days;  but  I  do 
want  to  speak  of  the  evil  political  spirit  that 
arose  and  that  became  the  furies  of  Greece,  and 
the  ultimate  cause  of  its  downfall,  the  spirit  that 
the  Greeks  called  (rrdat^;^  or  sedition,  a  disease  of 
society  which  sprang  out  of  the  great  inequality 
which  existed  between  the  rich  and  the  poor,  and 
which  may  be  defined  as  "  a  standing  up  in  the 
state  of  one  party  with  a  malicious  intent  toward 
another." 

During  the  Peloponnesian  War  this  dreadful 
thing  caused  so  much  anxiety  in  the  mind  of 
Thucydides  that  he  called  the  attention  of  his 
countrymen  to  it  in  language  so  weighty  and 
so  earnest  that  it  is  worth  our  while  to  see  what 
it  is  that  this  philosophic  historian  tried  so 
seriously  to  portray  and  define.  ^'  Kevolution," 
he  says,^  "brought  upon  the  cities  of  Hellas 
many  terrible  calamities,  such  as  have  been 
and  always  will  be  while  human  nature  re- 
mains the  same,  but  which  are  more  or  less 
aggravated  and  differ  in  character  with  every 
new  combination  of  circumstances,"  and  which 

»(iii.  82.) 


88  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

are  especially  accentuated  in  war.  "  When  trou- 
bles had  once  begun  in  the  cities,  those  who  fol- 
lowed carried  the  revolutionary  spirit  further 
and  further,  and  determined  to  outdo  the  report 
of  all  who  had  preceded  them  b}^  the  ingenuity 
of  their  enterprises  and  the  atrocity  of  their  re- 
venges. The  meaning  of  words  had  no  longer 
the  same  relation  to  things,  but  was  changed  by 
them  as  they  thought  proper.  Keckless  daring 
was  held  to  be  loyal  courage  ;  prudent  delay  was 
the  excuse  of  a  coward ;  moderation  was  the  dis- 
guise of  unmanly  weakness ;  to  know  everything 
was  to  do  nothing.  Frantic  energy  was  the  true 
quality  of  a  man.  .  .  .  He  who  could  out- 
strip another  in  a  bad  action  was  applauded ;  and 
so  was  he  who  encouraged  to  evil  one  who  had 
no  idea  of  it.  The  tie  of  party  was  stronger  than 
the  tie  of  blood,  because  a  partisan  was  more 
ready  to  dare  without  asking  why."  * 

Thucydides  says  that  ^'the  cause  of  all  these 
evils,"  which  led  to  the  destruction  of  Greece, 
"was  the  love  of  power  originating  in  avarice 
and  ambition,  and  the  party-spirit  which  is  en- 
gendered by  them  when  men  were  fairly  embarked 
in  a  contest.  For  the  leaders  on  either  side  used 
specious  names,  the  one  party  professing  to  up- 
hold the  constitutional  equality  of  the  many,  the 
other  the  wisdom  of  an  aristocracy,  while  they 
»  (Jowett's  Thucydides,  p.  222.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE,  89 

made  the  public  interests,  to  which  in  name  they 
were  devoted,  in  reality  their  prize.  Striving  in 
every  way  to  overcome  each  other,  .  .  . 
neither  party  observed  any  definite  limits,  either 
of  justice  or  public  expediency,  but  both  alike 
made  the  caprice  of  the  moment  their  law. 
Either  by  the  help  of  an  unrighteous  sentence, 
or  grasping  power  with  the  strong  hand,  they 
were  eager  to  satiate  the  impatience  of  party- 
spirit."  ^ 

Party  spirit,  or  sedition,  however,  was  not  the 
ultimate,  but  the  immediate  cause  of  the  disease 
of  the  TToAi?.  The  ultimate  cause  was  its  lack  of 
unity.  The  Grecian  state,  with  all  the  states  of 
ancient  times,  was  founded  upon  the  family  and 
the  family  idea.  First  came  the  family  and  then 
its  enlargement,  the  clans,  but  the  clans  never 
extended  themselves.  The  next  step  was  a  fed- 
eration of  clans  rather  than  an  extension  of  one 
or  many,  and  though  the  clans  were  afterward 
broken  up,  or  set  aside,  by  another  method  of 
grouping  the  people,  that  is,  by  classification  by 
wealth  and  ability  to  fight,  caste  distinction  and 
caste  ideas  never  disappeared,  and  the  members 
of  a  city-state  were  never  regarded  as  being 
one  great  family,  naturally  or  artificially  consti- 
tuted. Hence  it  was  that  love  and  good-will  and 
benevolence  of  all  toward  all,  and  of  one  toward 

»  {Id.,  p.  223.) 


90  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  many,  never  came  into  play  and  operation. 
In  every  city  the  well-born  and  the  base-born, 
the  rich  and  the  poor,  were  enemies  living  side 
by  side,  the  one  coveting  wealth,  the  other  seeing 
his  wealth  coveted.  No  religion,  no  service,  no 
labor  united  them ;  there  were  no  ties  of  blood 
that  were  considered  to  exist  between  the  well- 
born and  the  low-born,  and  labor  generally  was 
done  by  slaves.  The  poor  sought  to  acquire 
wealth  by  despoiling  the  rich,  the  rich  could  de- 
fend their  property  only  by  their  superior  knowl- 
edge, or  by  oppressing  the  poor.  Both  parties 
regarded  each  other  with  hatred  and  aversion. 
There  was  generally  a  double  conspiracy  in  every 
city :  one  of  the  poor  who  conspired  from  cupid- 
ity, and  one  of  the  rich  who  conspired  from  fear. 
Speaking  of  the  numerous  seditions  in  the 
city-states  of  Greece  Aristotle  says  that  "the 
main  cause  of  revolutions  in  Democracies  is  the 
intemperate  conduct  of  the  demagogues  who 
force  the  propertied  class  to  combine  partly  by 
instituting  malicious  prosecutions  against  individ- 
uals— for  the  worst  enemies  are  united  by  a  com- 
mon fear — and  partly  by  inciting  the  masses 
against  them  as  a  body."^  On  the  other  hand, 
he  avers  that  revolutions  in  oligarchies  generally 
assume  two  conspicuous  forms,  the  first  is  the 
case,  and  the  most  usual  one,  "  where  the  Oli- 

»  (Politics,  Book  VIII.,  Chap,  v.,  p.  355.) 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  91 

garchs  oppress  the  masses,"  the  second  is  where 
seditions  arise  among  the  oligarchs  themselves.^ 
The  cause  of  the  decline  and  fall  of  the  city- 
state  of  Rome  was  a  different  one.  Eome  mani- 
fested ever  greater  elasticity  than  the  city-states 
of  Greece,  and  extended  her  rights  and  privileges 
first  to  her  plebs,  then  to  the  Latin  cities  around 
her,  then  to  the  cities  of  Italy,  then  to  her  colo- 
nies, and  at  last  to  all  the  cities  throughout  the 
broad  extent  of  her  dominions.  It  was  a  long 
and  arduous  fight  that  was  waged  by  the  unpriv- 
ileged for  the  great  right  of  Roman  citizenship ; 
and  at  one  time,  when  the  plebs  withdrew  to 
Mons  Sace7%  it  looked  as  if  the  commonwealth 
of  Rome  would  be  impaired,  and  her  great  future 
prevented  ;  but  this  danger  of  dissolution  having 
been  overcome  by  concession  and  compromise, 
other  like  dangers,  as  they  arose,  were  success- 
ively overcome  in  a  like  manner,  and  the  great 
city-state  by  the  Tiber  at  last  seemed  as  secure 
on  her  seven  hills,  as  the  hills  on  the  face  of  the 
earth.  It  is  true  that  there  arose  from  time  to 
time  in  the  history  and  development  of  Rome, 
feuds  and  wars  between  the  privileged  and  the 
unprivileged,  the  high-born  and  the  base-born, 
the  rich  and  the  poor ;  yet  were  these  contests 
ever  happily  terminated;  and,  though  Rome  was 
governed  always  by  an  oligarchy  or  by  an  em- 

»(/<i.,  Cbap.  vi.,  p.  358.) 


92  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

peror,  the  political  distinction  between  citizen 
and  citizen  gradually  became  minimized,  and,  at 
last,  obliterated,  until  all  stood  on  the  same  level 
before  the  law.  It  is  one  of  the  strange  facts  of 
history  that  the  difference  between  citizen  and 
subject  was  so  gradually  obliterated  that  no  one 
can  tell  the  date  nor  the  name  of  the  prince  who 
published  the  decree  which  granted  the  right  of 
citizenship  to  all  freemen  without  distinction. 
The  reason  why  this  decree  did  not  strike  the 
imagination  of  contemporaries,  and  was  not  re- 
corded by  historians,  is  because  the  change  of 
which  it  was  the  logical  expression  had  been  ac- 
complished years  before.  The  inequality  be- 
tween citizen  and  subject,  or,  as  we  may  say,  be- 
tween the  privileged  and  the  unprivileged,  had 
been  lessened  from  generation  to  generation, 
until  the  two  had  been  brought  together.  Of 
course,  the  distinction  between  the  rich  and 
the  poor  remained,  but  this  seems  to  have  been 
the  only  difference  that  existed  between  the 
citizens  of  the  Koman  Empire  during  the  last 
centuries  of  its  life.  When  Koman  citizenship 
became  universal,  all  the  cities  of  the  ancient 
world  had  gradually  disappeared  and  the  city 
of  Kome  alone  was  left  in  her  broad  domain ; 
and  this  city  became  so  transformed  that  it  was 
the  meeting-place,  the  union  and  the  tie,  for  a 
thousand  nationalities,  under  one  imperial  sway. 


THE  ANCIENT  STATE.  93 

It  may  be  said  that  the  city-state  of  Eome  de- 
clined and  fell  by  reason  of  its  own  weight,  and 
to  a  certain  extent  this  is  true.  It  reached  the 
limit  of  its  extension,  and  then  it  fell  and  became 
something  other.  But  the  question  arises,  why 
did  it  reach  its  limit  ?  why  did  it  not  transform 
itself  into  something  new,  into  something  like 
our  modern  national  state  ?  Undoubtedly,  as  I 
take  it,  because  its  citizens  had  lost  the  family 
idea  and  mode  of  action.  The  Gauls,  the  Span- 
iards, the  Syrians,  and  the  Greeks,  did  not  feel 
themselves  to  belong  to  one  and  the  same  family, 
although  they  were  all  Eoman  citizens.  The 
right  of  citizenship  was  a  conventional  thing, 
something,  indeed,  that  was  established  by  law 
and  not  by  natural  relationship,  nor  yet  by  any 
spiritual  bond.  They  never,  themselves,  had  any 
feeling  of  responsibility  for  others,  nor  did  they 
dream  of  others  having  a  feeling  of  responsibility 
for  them.  They  never  fulfilled  any  obligations 
except  those  that  were  made  necessary  by  the 
invasion  of  a  common  enemy,  and  not  always 
then.  The  only  factor  in  the  world,  when  the 
Koman  Empire  fell,  that  could  have  brought  into 
play  the  idea  of  brotherhood  and  the  principle 
of  responsibility,  was  Christianity ;  but  this  effect 
of  the  teaching  of  Christ  was  only  dimly  per- 
ceived, and  the  leaven  of  the  new  life  of  the 
world  had  only  just  begun  to  work.     But  here 


94  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

we  touch  upon  something  that  has  made  possible 
the  modern  national  state,  and  that  makes  man- 
kind to  hope  for,  and  to  look  forward  to,  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  world-wide  kingdom  of  Christ, 
in  which  the  Fatherhood  of  God  shall  be  acknowl- 
edged by  a  brotherhood  of  man.  I  must  leave 
the  consideration  of  Christianity  as  a  factor  in 
the  development  of  the  state  to  another  lecture. 


LECTUEE  III. 

THE  MODEEN   STATE. 

The  modern  state  offers  a  great  many  con- 
trasts to  the  ancient  state,  but  in  nothing  is  the 
contrast  so  marked  as  in  the  fact  that  the  state 
is  now  regarded  as  having  broken  with  the  old- 
world  idea,  that  religion  is  the  basis  of  society 
and  government.  The  civic  and  ecclesiastic 
powers  are  becoming  ever  more  and  more  sepa- 
rated, and  the  state,  while  not  considered  to  be 
immoral,  is  often  held  by  recent  writers  to  be 
non-moral^  and  its  many  activities  and  interests 
as  independent  of  any  religious  sanction.  The 
Church  of  England  is  still  the  state  church,  but 
it  is  evident  that  the  identification  of  the  church 
with  the  state  has  become  a  matter  of  form,  and 
is  a  survival  from  the  past,  and  will  not  long 
continue  in  the  present.  In  Eussia,  it  is  true, 
church  and  state,  religion  and  civic  life  run  along 
concurrently,  but  the  ideas  of  state  and  govern- 
ment in  Eussia  belong  rather  to  the  old  than  the 
new  order  of  things.  We  cannot  say  .that  re- 
ligion is  looked  upon  as  having  nothing  to  do 
with  law  among  the  states  of  the  "West ;  indeed, 

95 


96  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

the  Christian  religion  is  regarded  as  the  last  test 
of  all  the  laws  of  the  peoples  of  Christendom. 
IS'ot  that  Christianity  is  part  of  the  law  of  the  land 
in  the  sense  that  courts  must  take  notice  of,  and 
base  their  judgments  upon  it,  but  its  principles  and 
precepts,  as  they  have  become  part  of  the  mental 
furniture  of  individual  judges,  have  necessarily 
been  infused  into  thousands  of  opinions  upon 
which  judgments  are  based. 

The  idea  of  the  advisability  of  the  separation 
of  the  state  from  the  church  was  many  cen- 
turies in  developing,  but  since  the  constitution 
of  the  United  States  has  been  formed,  it  has 
steadily  grown  in  favor,  until  now  it  is  alto- 
gether dominant,  and  a  terminus  ad  quern  of 
most  of  the  socialistic  and  juristic  writers.  The 
sequence  of  the  evolution  of  the  secular  idea 
of  the  state  has  been  from  the  theological,  or 
theistical,  to  the  metaphysical,  and  thence  on 
to  the  positive  stage.  And  yet  we  must  perceive, 
when  we  examine  the  current  theory  of  the  state, 
that  the  old  notion  that  religion  is  the  basis  of  all 
civic  life  has  not  been  utterly  abandoned ;  it  has, 
for  the  most  part,  been  simply  shifted.  God,  or 
the  many  gods,  or  the  demi-gods,  are  not  now 
looked  upon  as  the  actual  founders  and  preservers 
of  the  state ;  but  for  those  who  believe  that  man 
was  created  in  the  Divine  Image,  there  is  always 
the  fundamental  belief  that  the  impulse  to  social 


THE  3I0DEEN  STATE.  97 

life  and  to  the  formation  and  development  of  the 
state,  comes  from  Him,  and  that  He  is  therefore 
concerned  with  all  things  pertaining  to  order  and 
government. 

The  second  thing  that  marks  the  contrast  be- 
tween the  modern  and  the  ancient  state  is  the 
idea  of  sovereignty.  It  is  a  difficult  task  to  de- 
fine just  what  the  modern  writers  mean  by  the 
term  ''sovereignty."  Indeed,  I  have  no  hesita- 
tion in  affirming  that  if  we  could  understand  al- 
ways what  they  mean,  and  that  they  would  agree 
upon  a  meaning  and  a  philosophy  of  the  term, 
we  would  have  a  thorough  and  comprehensive 
doctrine  of  the  state.  Etymologically  "sover- 
eign "  denoted  merely  superiority,  and  hence  in 
a  political  sense  simply  monarch,  or  other  superior 
officer  of  a  state ;  and  its  correlative  "  sover- 
eignty "  the  power  vested  in  a  sovereign.  Both 
terms  are  comparative,  and  there  is  nothing  in 
either  of  them  to  imply  that  the  sovereign  or 
supreme  power  in  the  state  is  unlimited  and  ab- 
solute ;  all  that  is  implied  is  that  the  sovereign  is 
superior  to  the  other  officers  of  the  state,  and  his 
power  a  superior  power  to  theirs.  Hence  the 
terms  were  originally  applied  not  only  to  the 
king  or  monarch,  but  to  his  feudatories,  who  each 
were  said  to  be  sovereign  in  his  own  domains. 
Afterward  the  term  came  to  be  restricted  by  the 
French  lawyers  to  the  monarch,  from  whom  it 


98  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

was  transferred  to  the  government  and  then  to 
the  state  as  distinguished  from  the  government.^ 
But  however  the  conception  has  grown,  we 
must  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  term  sover- 
eignty does  not  denote  a  mere  collection  of  pow- 
ers ;  it  does,  indeed,  include  and  necessitate  the 
possession  of  certain  powers,  such  as,  for  exam- 
ple, those  of  taxation,  of  contracting  treaties, 
maintaining  armies  and  navies,  etc. ;  but  its  con- 
tent is  not  exhausted  by  an  enumeration  of  these 
things.  It  is  an  entity  of  itself,  an  idea,  if  you 
will,  but  one  that  has  in  it  great  power  and  em- 
bodies the  highest  conception  of  political  life. 
Whether  men  to-day  believe  that  sovereignty  is 
absolute  and  unlimited  depends  upon  the  fact 
whether  they  consider  that  the  state  is  all-pow- 
erful. Is  the  state  all-powerful,  or  has  it  limita- 
tions that  control  it  in  its  very  nature  ?  It  seems 
to  me  that  the  state  is  limited,  like  as  all  facts  or 
things  that  we  know  in  the  creation  of  God. 
Even  if  we  give  the  state  personality  and  endow 
it  with  a  supreme  will,  it  does  not  make  it  om- 
nipotent and  its  will  irresistible.  The  will  of  the 
state  is  supreme  only  within  a  given  sphere.  It 
must  be  controlled  by  considerations  of  justice 
and  reason,  as  Guizot  pointed  out,  or  it  ceases  to  be 
will  and  becomes  force.  If  you  make  will  force, 
you  destroy  personality.     And  herein  we  see  the 

1  (The  Theory  of  the  State,  George  H.  Smith,  p.  43,  Xot€  E.) 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  99 

keen  insight  and  wisdom  of  Aristotle :  "  To  in- 
vest the  law  then  with  authority  is,  it  seems,  to 
invest  God  and  intelligence  only  :  to  invest  a  man 
is  to  introduce  a  beast,  as  desire  is  something 
bestial,  and  even  the  best  of  men  in  authority  are 
liable  to  be  corrupted  by  anger."  ^ 

The  ancients  had  no  conception  of  sovereignty 
such  as  we  moderns  have,  as  the  supreme  power 
of  the  state  that  exists  simply  for  the  life  of  the 
state  and  for  the  preservation  of  the  rights  of  the 
individual  citizens.  The  city-states  were  abso- 
lutely dominant  in  every  way,  as  they  embraced 
the  entire  life  of  men  in  community,  in  religion 
and  law,  in  morals  and  art,  in  culture  and  sci- 
ence. The  Eomans,  indeed,  almost  grasped  the 
idea  of  sovereignty  in  their  conception  of  the 
term  "  hnjperiiim^''  but  "  imjperiicm "  has  the 
thought  of  command  and  dominion  in  it,  rather 
than  supremacy  and  rule ;  and  its  correlative  is 
"  imperatory 

The  third  distinguishing  thing  that  makes  the 
difference  between  the  ancient  and  the  modern 
state  is  that  the  government  of  the  ancient  state 
was  unlimited  in  the  exercise  of  its  powers,  while 
that  of  the  modern  state  is  restricted  in  many 
ways.  It  is  not  correct  to  say  that  the  ancient 
states  had  no  constitutions ;  they  certainly  had 

^  (Politics,  Book  III.,  Chap,  xvi.,  p.  154,  Welldon's  Transla- 
tion.) 


100  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

none  as  we  now  understand  the  term  constitution, 
as  the  written,  and  sometimes  unwritten,  primary 
laws  of  organization  and  government,  which  are 
looked  upon  as  possessing  more  dignity  than  any 
other ;  yet  certainly  the  laws  of  Moses,  of  Lycur- 
gus,  of  Solon,  and  of  the  Twelve  Tables  of  Kome, 
established  certain  things  as  fundamental,  and  as 
we  might  properly  say,  constitutional.  Still  the 
state  was  regarded  by  the  ancients  as  superior  to 
any  law.  It  was  practically  omnipotent  and  had 
an  absolute  empire  over  its  members.  But  it  is 
not  so  with  us ;  the  power  or  sovereignty  of  the 
state  is  regarded  as  subject  to  the  constitutional 
law  of  the  same,  and  to  have  no  lawful  existence 
apart  from  it.  And  the  reason  for  this  distinc- 
tion is  not  far  to  seek.  Man  in  ancient  times  had 
only  the  rights  of  manhood  as  a  citizen.  Among 
the  Greeks  no  distinction  was  made  between  pub- 
lic and  private  law.  The  Romans  separated  them 
in  principle,  but  in  fact  their  private  law  remained 
ever  dependent  upon  the  will  of  the  state.  There 
was  absolutely  no  recognition  of  the  freedom  of 
the  individual  as  against  the  state.  But  to-day 
man  has  his  rights  as  man  first,  and  above  all 
other  considerations. 

Humanity  is  the  point  of  departure  of  modern 
law,  and  not  the  state.  Private  law  is  ever 
distinguished  from  public  law,  and  though  it  is 
fostered  by  the  state  and  often  times  formulated 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  101 

and  declared  by  its  organs,  it  is  not  created  by 
the  state.  The  freeman  is  not  now  absorbed 
into  the  state.  Although  it  can  not  be  said 
that  he  exists  apart  from  it,  for  no  man  can 
live  in  a  stateless  condition,  the  fact  is  he  ex- 
ists with,  and  is  a  part  of,  the  state,  and  this 
he  is  not  for  its  ends,  but  for  his  own — that  he 
may  be  free.  He  has  power  to  develop  himself 
and  to  exercise  his  manhood  according  to  his 
will,  limited  only  by  considerations  of  the  gen- 
eral good  or  well-being  of  all  the  people.  It  is 
for  these  reasons  that  slavery  cannot  exist  in  the 
modern  state.  That  it  has  existed,  we  know,  but 
only  as  an  anomaly  and  as  a  survival  from  an- 
cient times.  To-day,  as  every  man  has  full 
rights,  all  men  are  free,  and  no  man  ha§  any 
property  in  any  other.  And  hence  it  is,  too,  as 
man  is  free,  that  labor  is  free,  and  has  secured  a 
position  of  dignity  that  it  never  had  in  the  an- 
cient world.  And  with  the  freedom  of  all  men 
and  the  elevation  of  labor,  has  come  the  endow- 
ment of  all  with  political  powers.  In  the  ancient 
state  not  one-half  of  its  population  were  citizens. 
The  state  to-day  rests  upon  the  broad  basis  of 
humanity.  As  a  rule,  all  men  within  its  confines 
are  its  citizens ;  and  all  adult  males,  generally, 
have  political  powers  and  the  right  of  suffrage. 
And  this  aggregate  of  humanity  stands  above  all 
promulgated  law  in  that  it  has  the  power  to 


102  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

change  it,  though,  be  it  observed,  it  does  not 
stand  above  the  consideration  of  reason  and  jus- 
tice, for  these  things  are  integral  parts  of  hu- 
manity itself.  Men  do  not  exist  for  the  state  and 
government,  but  the  state  and  government  exist 
for  them. 

The  fourth  thing  wherein  the  difference  be- 
tween the  ancient  and  the  modern  state  is  mani- 
fested is,  that  in  ancient  days  public  authority 
was  directly  exercised  by  its  holders,  whereas,  in 
the  modern  state  it  is  exercised  vicariously  by 
the  representatives  of  the  people.  In  the  ancient 
republics  the  citizens  appeared  in  great  popular 
assemblies  and  passed  upon  and  decided  all  public 
matters.  In  the  modern  constitutional  states  the 
citizens  choose  from  their  number  certain  men  to 
act  for  them.  And  yet  we  must  not  understand 
that  there  were  no  traces  of  representative  gov- 
ernment in  the  ancient  state.  The  Senate  of 
Eome  undoubtedly  offered  the  model  of  many  of 
our  modern  representative  chambers.  It  is  true 
that  the  people  did  not  elect  directly  to  it,  but  it 
was  made  up  largely  of  men  who  had  been  elected 
by  them  to  office  and  had  served  acceptably 
therein.  The  rise  and  development  of  represent- 
ative government  is  not  hard  to  trace,  for  it  is  a 
comparatively  new  thing  in  the  life  of  mankind. 
Neither  the  old  village  communities  nor  the  city- 
states  knew  of  it,  for  they  were  based  upon  the 


THE  3I0DEBN  STATE.  103 

Opposite  principle  of  direct  and  personal  partici- 
pation in  the  government. 

To-day  everywhere  the  representative  prin- 
ciple is  the  prevailing  one,  as  well  in  the  cities 
and  boroughs  as  in  the  national  and  provincial 
legislatures.  Yet  there  are  places  where  the 
old  principle  of  direct  and  personal  participa- 
tion in  government  prevails,  namely  in  the  towns 
and  communal  meetings,  and  in  the  referendum 
and  plehiscite.  Indeed,  one  of  the  tendencies 
of  the  present  rule  of  democracy  is  the  return 
to  the  old  ways  as  much  as  possible,  for  repre- 
sentative government  has  in  it  much  that  is  aris- 
tocratic, which  democracy  fears.  The  origin  of 
the  modern  representative  system  has  been  shown 
by  Professor  Adams  to  be  found  in  the  local 
courts,  the  assemblies  of  the  second  grade,  of  the 
early  German  states.  The  assemblies  of  the  first 
grade,  the  tribal  or  national  councils,  acted  as 
direct  democracies  in  the  election  of  kings  and 
chiefs,  and  in  the  pronouncing  of  decisions  and 
judgments.  The  local  hundred  and  shire  courts 
were  presided  over  by  chiefs,  it  is  true,  who  an- 
nounced the  verdict  or  judgment,  but  they  de- 
rived their  validity  from  the  decisions  of  the 
assemblies,  or,  in  later  times,  from  those  of  a 
number  of  their  body  appointed  to  act  for  the 
whole.  "  These  local  courts,  probably,  as  has  been 
suggested,  because  of  the  comparatively  restricted 


104  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

character  of  the  powers  which  they  possessed, 
were  destined  to  a  long  life.  On  the  continent 
they  lasted  until  the  very  end  of  the  middle  ages, 
when  they  were  generally  overthrown  by  the  in- 
troduction of  the  Koman  law,  too  highly  scientific 
for  their  simple  methods.  In  England  they  lasted 
until  they  furnished  the  model  and  probably  the 
suggestion  for  a  far  more  important  institution — 
the  House  of  Commons."  ^ 

The  extension  of  representative  government 
does  not  concern  us  here,  as  it  is  a  matter  of  gen- 
eral history ;  but  it  is  noteworthy  for  us  who  are 
citizens  of  the  United  States,  that  as  representa- 
tive monarchy  developed  in  England,  representa- 
tive democracy  has  become  fully  established  in 
North  America.  The  English  colonists  of  New 
England  and  Virginia,  and  the  Dutch  of  New 
York,  brought  from  their  old  homes  the  love 
of  self-government,  liberty  and  legality.  They 
brought  also  a  faith  in  the  honesty  of  humanity 
and  a  belief  that  the  common  and  mutual  inter- 
ests of  all  could  be  trusted  to  chosen  representa- 
tives who  should  act  for  all.  There  is  no  doubt 
that  the  representative  assemblies  of  the  colonies 
arose  greatly  out  of  the  long  distances  that  ex- 
isted between  the  planters  and  farmers,  yet  the 
principle  of  representation  was  a  part  of  the 

'  (Civilization  During  the  Middle  Ages,  George  Burton 
Adams,  Chap.  v.  p.  96.) 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  105 

common  stock  of  their  political  knowledge,  and 
was  put  into  effect  naturally.  It  was  because 
this  principle  was  a  part  of  their  whole  mental 
make-up  that  the  cry  arose  so  easily  of  "no  taxa- 
tion without  representation."  One  would  sup- 
pose, in  reading  the  history  of  the  American 
Eevolution,  that  this  cry  was  as  old  as  govern- 
ment itself,  whereas  it  was  a  comparatively  new 
thing  among  the  children  of  men. 

The  fifth  and  last  thing  that  we  will  notice, 
wherein  the  difference  between  the  ancient  and 
the  modern  state  is  shown,  is,  that,  whereas  the 
ancient  state  felt  itself  to  be  limited  externally 
only  by  the  power  of  resistance  of  other  states, 
the  modern  state  recognizes  that  there  is  an  inter- 
national law  acting  in  limiting  its  dominion,  and 
as  a  principle  of  conduct  in  its  relation  to  other 
states.  International  law  has  become  the  shield 
and  protection  of  all  the  states  of  western  civili- 
zation, rejecting  imperatively  the  dominion  of 
one  state  over  any  other  which  does  not  desire  to 
submit  to  it.  Rome  pursued  relentlessly  the  do- 
minion of  the  world  as  her  natural  privilege,  and 
though  she  made  an  advance  upon  the  idea  of 
conquest  that  prevailed  in  the  world  before  her 
in  the  finding  of  a  jus  gentium^  she  never  looked 
upon  other  peoples  as  having  rights  of  existence 
as  against  herself.  The  idea  of  the  right  of  con- 
quest was  revamped  in  the  beginning  of  the  cen- 


106  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

tury  by  J^apoleon  and  the  French  in  Europe,  and 
the  Germans  have  more  recently  shown  a  leaning 
towards  it ;  still  the  idea  of  the  right  of  dominion 
of  one  state  over  another  and  of  the  making  of 
independent  states  into  dependents  and  tribu- 
taries has  faded  away  among  the  nations  of  our 
western  civilization,  except  in  their  dealings  with 
the  lower  races  of  mankind.  And  thus  it  is  that 
we  see  that  although  Eussia  and  England  and 
the  other  European  nations  may  parcel  out  the 
moribund  Empire  of  China,  and  the  United  States 
may  buy  the  "  sovereignty "  of  the  Philippine 
Islands,  and  subjugate  their  inhabitants  with  im- 
punity, a  Charles  the  Bold  would  not  be  suffered 
to  attack  Switzerland  to-day,  nor  a  Philip  11.  the 
Netherlands.  All  the  great  powers  would  inter- 
fere and  put  down  such  actions  as  against  the 
common  policy  of  Europe. 

The  source  or  origin  of  international  law  is  to 
be  found  in  the^W  gentium  of  Eome,  which  law 
or  body  of  laws  arose  out  of  the  fact  that  ancient 
Rome  was  a  place  of  refuge  and  a  centre  of  ac- 
tivity of  the  many  neighboring  peoples,  and,  as 
the  jios  civile  of  Pome  could  not  be  applied  to 
any  but  citizens  of  that  city,  there  came  a  neces- 
sity for  finding  some  rules  and  customs  that  were 
common  to  Rome  and  these  outside  and  foreign 
peoples.  Hence  grew  the  jus  gentium,  or  the 
law  that  is  common  to  nations.     "  Jus  gentium 


THE  MODERN  STATE,  107 

was,  in  fact  the  sum  of  the  common  ingredients 
in  the  customs  of  the  old  Italian  tribes,  for  they 
were  all  the  nations  whom  the  Komans  had  the 
means  of  observing,  and  who  sent  successive 
swarms  of  immigrants  to  Eoman  soil."  ^  It  is  not 
necessary  here  to  point  out  how  the  jus  gentium 
under  the  influence  of  the  Stoic  philosophers  and 
jurists  became  closely  identified  with  the  law  of 
nature,  nor  how  the  law  of  nature,  in  the  thought 
of  the  schoolmen,  became  part  of  the  eternal  law 
of  God.  It  was  after  ih.QJus  gentium  had  passed 
through  and  had  been  developed  by  these  ideas 
that  it  came  into  the  hands  of  Grotius  and 
Hobbes,  and  received  a  scientific  treatment.  By 
these  the  natural  and  divine  laws  were  separated, 
and  nature  was  looked  upon  as  providing  rules 
for  the  conduct  of  man,  by  reason  of  his  very 
nature.  Then  by  a  logical  extension,  but  a  mis- 
translation,/t^^  gentium  was  made  to  mean  the 
law  between  nations,  and  thus  a  fictitious  validity 
was  given  it,  which  went  far  toward  securing  its 
recognition  at  the  hands  of  sovereign  rulers  who 
had  already  accepted  the  idea  of  natural  law 
binding  upon  men,  and  of  natural  rights  secured 
to  them  by  natural  law. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  one  of  the  great  distin- 
guishing facts  that  marks  the  difference  between 
the  ancient  and  modern  life  of  the  race  is  the 

•  (Maine,  Ancient  Law,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  47.) 


108  TEE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

ever  increasing  internationality  of  interests.  The 
principles  of  international  comity  and  conduct 
that  are  generally  accepted  by  all  civilized  peo- 
ples to-day  constitute  a  body  of  law  that  is  con- 
siderable in  extent,  and  that  is  constantly  grow- 
ing in  bulk  and  importance.  States  are  united 
now  by  treaties,  not  simply  for  the  purposes  of 
military  and  naval  offence  and  defence,  but  for 
the  regulation  and  control  of  common  political 
and  economic  interests.  In  many  cases  joint  ad- 
ministrative organs  have  been  established,  and 
international  commissions  for  the  regulation  of 
the  navigation  of  rivers  and  canals,  for  the  pres- 
ervation and  control  of  fisheries,  and  for  the 
proper  conduct  of  postal,  telegraph  and  railway 
services,  are  constantly  in  session.  The  state 
undertakes  to-day  to  protect  its  citizens  beyond 
its  own  borders,  and,  with  the  assistance  of 
friendly  powers,  to  bring  back  its  criminals  to 
justice.  And  when  it  fears  that  justice  cannot 
be  had,  that  is,  among  barbarous  and  semi-civi- 
lized peoples,  it  asserts  the  right  of  its  consular 
agents  to  exercise  judicial  and  administrative 
functions,  which  right  is  secured  by  definite 
treaties.  The  Peace  Conference  summoned  by 
invitation  of  the  Tzar  at  The  Hague,  was  a  great 
step  in  advance,  taken  to  bring  all  the  external 
affairs  of  the  nations  under  definite  rules  and  to 
make  the  international  interests  of  each  the  in- 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  109 

terest  of  all.  The  plan  for  arbitration  set  forth 
by  it  gives  us  an  additional  reason  to  look  for- 
ward to  the  day  to  which  the  noblest  minds  of 
Christendom  have  aspired : 

"  Till  the  war  drum  throbs  no  longer,  and  the  battle  flags  are 
furl'd, 
In  the  Parliament  of  man,  the  Federation  of  the  world." 

It  seems,  when  we  compare  the  ancient  and 
the  modern  ideas  of  the  state,  that  the  differ- 
ences between  them  are  numerous  and  decided. 
In  fact,  the  states  of  the  old  and  of  the  new 
world  have  so  little  in  common,  that  they  appear 
to  belong  to  other  and  different  dispensations  of 
Providence.  It  may  be  said  literally  that  the 
one  thing  in  common  that  they  have  is  human 
nature,  and  because  of  this,  and  this  alone,  the 
arts  that  Greece  developed,  the  law  that  Kome 
perfected,  the  morality  that  the  Jews  strove  to 
attain,  are  as  true  and  as  basal  to-day  as  in  the 
past.  Of  course,  it  is  understood  there  has  been 
and  there  can  be,  no  state  without  organiza- 
tion, whether  definite  or  indefinite ;  and  for  the 
organization  of  a  state  there  must  have  been — 
there  must  always  be — the  three  great  powers, 
the  judicial,  the  executive  and  the  legislative,  no 
matter  whether  they  be  exercised  by  the  same 
or  by  different  heads  or  bodies. 

Another  thing  we  must  remark  when  we  con- 


110  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

sider  and  compare  the  ancient  and  the  modern 
state  is  that,  whereas,  in  ancient  times  the  origins 
of  states  are  shrouded  and  obscured  by  igno- 
rance or  mythological  tradition,  the  beginnings 
of  all  the  states  of  our  western  civilization  can 
be  traced  with  absolute  certainty.  But  before 
we  seek  to  trace  the  rise  of  the  modern  state,  let 
us  keep  well  in  mind  the  difference  between  a 
new  state  and  a  new  government.  It  is  gener- 
ally proclaimed  in  these  days  of  rising  democracy 
that  a  new  state  can  come  into  existence  at  any 
time  by  and  through  the  will  of  the  people.  A 
national  or  common  feeling,  it  is  said,  must  exist, 
but  granted  that  there  be  a  national  or  common 
feeling,  a  national  or  common  will  will  arise  of 
necessity.  This  we  all  perceive  ;  but  we  per- 
ceive something  more,  that  this  national  or  com- 
mon will  is  a  different  thing  from  the  sum  of  the 
particular  wills  of  all  the  citizens ;  and  that  it 
may  be  something  more  or  something  less  than 
the  sum  of  the  wills  of  the  majority.  And  this 
Kousseau  himself  recognized.  "  There  is  often  a 
great  deal  of  difference  between  the  will  of  all 
and  the  general  will.  The  last  has  regard  only 
for  the  common  interest ;  the  other  for  private 
interest,  and  is  only  the  sum  of  particular  wills."  ^ 
How  the  national  or  common  will  comes  into 
existence  is  the  vital  question.     Kousseau  goes  on 

*  iContrat  Social,  Liv.  II.,  Chap,  iii.) 


THE  310 BERN  STATE.  Ill 

to  say :  "  Take  from  the  particular  wills  the  more 
or  less  which  neutralize  themselves,  and  their  re- 
mains for  the  sum  of  the  differences  the  general 
will."  ^  But  this  is  absurd.  The  common  or  gen- 
eral will  cannot  be  ascertained  by  any  mathemat- 
ical calculation ;  it  must  be  a  unit  in  itself,  other- 
wise the  state  has  no  unity  and  no  personality, 
and  personality  is  the  distinguishing  mark  of  the 
state  in  both  the  scientific  and  the  popular  mind. 
The  true  philosophy  of  the  national  or  com- 
mon will  seems  to  me  to  be  stated  by  Dr.  Wil- 
loughby.  "In  a  political  society  every  human 
being  may  be  regarded  in  a  double  aspect ;  as  an 
independent  individual  endowed  with  freedom  of 
self-determination  of  action ;  and  as  a  citizen,  or 
member  of  the  body  politic  in  which  he  lives. 
As  a  citizen  he  can  never  be  considered  apart 
from  the  whole,  of  which  he  is  an  integral  and 
inseparable  part.  Nor,  consequently,  can  his  will 
as  such  be  separated  from  the  General  Will.  It 
is  in  this  second  capacity  that  he  is  related  to 
the  State,  and  contributes  by  his  will  to  the  for- 
mation of  its  sovereign  will.  And  it  is  upon  him 
in  this  same  capacity  that  the  authority  of  the 
State  is  exercised.  He  is  coerced  by  the  law, 
not  as  a  free  autonomous  person,  but  as  a  con- 
stituent element  of  the  authority  that  coerces 
him.  He  is  an  integral  and  inseparable  part  of 
'{Id.) 


112  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  political  body,  and  his  will  cannot  be  sepa- 
rated from  its  will."  ^ 

But  why  a  man  as  a  citizen  cannot  be  con- 
sidered apart  from  the  whole  of  society  in  which 
he  lives,  and  why  he  is,  ex  necessitate^  an  "in- 
tegral and  inseparable  part "  thereof,  neither  Dr. 
Willoughby  nor  any  of  the  modern  secular 
writers  seek  to  discover  and  set  forth.  They 
take  us  back  to  the  old  saying  of  Aristotle  that 
man  is  by  nature  a  political  animal,  and  some- 
times they  lay  stress  upon  the  fact  which  Maine 
has  shown  by  historical  research  that  originally 
men  lived  in  families,  and  in  communities  that  at 
first  resembled  families.  But  this  key  to  their 
theories  they  refuse  logically  to  apply.  They 
refuse  to  see  the  truth  that  the  social  instinct 
or  impulse  of  man  is  in  the  development  of  the 
family  life,  and  that  a  permanent  family  life  is 
his  natural  state,  for  without  it  there  could  be 
no  such  thing  as  humanity.  How  closely  the 
family  is  interwoven  with  men's  first  ideas  of  the 
state  is  shown  by  the  late  Professor  Bluntschli  in 
his  chapter  on  the  "  Family  Kingship  Among  the 
Greeks  and  Germans."  He  shows  that  the  very 
name  of  "king,"  among  the  Germans  "  Chim- 
ing "  or  "  Kun-ing,"*^  comes  from  "  chun "  or 
"  cliuni^^  family.^     Yet  Bluntschli  himself  misses 

1  Willoughby,  The  Nature  of  the  State,  Chap,  vi.,  p.  125.) 
'(The  Theory  of  the  State,  Book  VI.,  Chap,  viii.,  p.  362.) 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  113 

the  very  point  he  has  made.  He  says  in  another 
place,  on  "The  Kelation  of  the  State  to  the 
Family:"  "Ancients  and  moderns  alike  have 
found  in  the  family  the  pattern  of  the  State. 
The  State,  they  say,  is  an  extension  of  the  family, 
the  head  of  the  State  being  the  father,  the  peo- 
ple his  children.  This  comparison  is  only  true  in 
a  limited  sense ;  it  only  applies  to  the  patriarchal 
State,  not  to  the  higher  forms  of  the  State  which 
are  based  on  nationality  or  humanity."  ^ 

But  "  nationality,"  all  writers  agree,  is  a  vary- 
ing and  fluctuant  term,  and  some  states  are  not 
based  upon  nationality  at  all,  if  we  use  Blunt- 
schli's  definition ;  ^  for  example,  the  states  of 
Switzerland,  and  of  the  United  States,  and  the 
Empire  of  Austria  ;  and  if  we  use  our  own  gen- 
erally accepted  definition,  a  nation  can  exist  only 
subsequent  to  the  state  itself. 

All  states  are  based  upon  humanity,  but  though 
the  state  be  based  upon  humanity,  it  is  not  hu- 
manity in  the  abstract,  for  there  is  no  such  thing ; 

>(/(?.,  Book  II.,  Chap,  xix.,  p.  195.) 

""In  English  the  word  'people,'  like  the  French  ^peuple,^ 
implies  the  notion  of  a  civilization,  which  the  Germans  (like 
the  old  Eomans  in  the  word  ^natio ')  express  by  Nation.  The 
political  idea  is  expressed  in  English  by  '  Nation, '  and  in  Ger- 
man by  Volk.  Etymology  is  in  favor  of  German  usage,  for  the 
word  natio  ( from  nasci)  points  to  birth  and  race,  Volk  and 
populus  rather  to  the  public  life  of  a  State  (TroAfj)."  (Jd, 
Book  II.,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  86.) 


114  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

nor  can  it  be  upon  humanity  in  the  individual, 
else  would  Hobbes'  or  Kousseau's  theories  hold 
true.  ]N'o,  the  state  is  based  upon  humanity  in 
families,  and  it  is  only  a  well-organized  state  as 
it  takes  cognizance  of  this  truth.  The  fact  that 
the  tie  of  the  family  is  marriage  does  not  militate 
against  this,  for  the  result  of  marriage  is  brother- 
hood. Brotherhood  is  the  ideal  of  every  people, 
of  all  humanity.  The  great  truth  promulgated 
by  St.  Paul  has  been  accepted  to-day  by  all 
mankind,  that  God  "  made  of  one  every  nation 
of  men  for  to  dwell  on  all  the  face  of  the  earth." 
That  the  state  has  no  necessary  relation  to  the 
soil,  as  Bluntschli  and  many  others  aver,  and  can 
exist  apart  from  it,  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
Hebrew  state  existed  while  it  was  yet  in  the  years 
of  its  pilgrimage,  and  so  did  the  Frankish  and 
Burgundian  and  other  Germanic  states,  while  as 
yet  the  people  had  no  fixed  domiciles.  It  was 
the  feudal  system  which  made  the  state  to  be 
conterminous  with  and  based  upon  land.  The 
kings  of  the  Franks  became  kings  of  France ; 
but  with  the  destruction  of  this  system  the  king 
or  emperor  of  Finance  became  king  or  emperor 
of  the  French,  and  thus  the  head  of  the  state 
took  his  rightful  place,  not  as  the  lord  and  master 
of  the  land  and  of  its  inhabitants,  but  as  the 
father  and  protector  of  the  people  who  happened 
to  live  under  his  authority  and  rule  on  the  land. 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  115 

And  this  same  change  has  been,  and  is  in  process 
of  becoming  among  the  other  peoples  of  the 
world.  The  king  of  the  upper  half  of  the  old 
IsTetherlands  is  not  the  king  of  Belgium,  but  of 
the  Belgians,  and  there  is  no  king  of  Greece,  but 
of  the  Hellenes.  It  is  worthy  of  remark  also  in 
this  connection  that  when  the  present  German 
Empire  was  established,  the  title  conferred  by 
the  assembled  princes  at  Versailles  upon  the  king 
of  Prussia,  was  not  Emperor  of  Germany  but 
German  Emperor.  It  is  true  that  the  Queen  of 
Great  Britain  and  Ireland  is  still  styled  Queen 
of  the  land,  but  every  one  knows  that  the  term 
"queen"  in  Great  Britain  stands  for  the  term 
"  state,"  and  that  her  power  has  passed  to  the 
House  of  Commons,  which  has,  and  which  exer- 
cises, an  absolutely  paternal  power  over  all  the 
interests  and  peoples  of  the  realm.  One  of  the 
most  striking  things  in  regard  to  the  state  and 
government  of  that  great  empire  in  these  times 
is  the  contrast  that  is  offered  by  observing  that 
one  day  there  will  be  a  bill  before  Parliament 
for  the  protection  of  a  British  subject  in  some 
far-off  island  of  the  Pacific,  the  next  a  bill  for 
building  some  war  ships  for  coast  defence,  the 
next  a  bill  for  the  regulation  of  the  affairs  of 
government  of  millions  of  subjects  in  India. 

Again,  I  desire  to  draw  attention  to  the  fact 
that  the  contention  that  Professor  Bluntschli  and 


116  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

his  school  make,  that  the  state  is  political  and  that 
the  family  is  not,  has  no  bearing  upon  the  matter. 
He  says  that  the  family  and  the  state  differ  in  char- 
acter, the  head  of  the  family  is  the  father  whose 
authority  "  is  essentially  a  guardianship  "  ( Yo7'- 
mimdschaft)  while  "  in  the  nation  the  different 
classes  have  interests  apart  from  those  of  the 
prince,  their  head  " ;  that  "the  government  of  the 
State  is  political."  ^  After  all,  what  do  we  mean  by 
the  term  "•  political "  ?  We  know  that  it  comes 
from  the  word  7z6Xi<i  and  that  the  -noXi?  was  the  city- 
state  of  the  Greeks.  "  Politic  "  or  "  politics  "  is  the 
science  that  pertains  to  the  order  and  government 
of  the  state  and  its  life  and  conduct,  although, 
be  it  observed,  it  is  sometimes  held  by  non-Gre- 
cian writers  to  mean  only  the  last  half  of  this 
definition,  and  '^  Staatsrechf^^  or  public  law,  to 
mean  the  first  half.  "  Political "  is  the  adjective 
of  "  politic." 

We  speak  to-day  generally  of  Political  Science 
and  of  Social  Science :  By  Social  Science  we  mean 
the  ascertainment  of  the  laws  and  customs  and 
usages  that  govern  men  in  the  aggregate,  living 
together  and  united  by  mutual  interests  and  re- 
lationships. By  Political  Science  we  mean  the 
ascertainment  of  the  laws  and  customs  and  usages 
that  govern  men  organized  in  some  form  of  gov- 
ernment or  order.     The  body  politic  may  be  de- 

1  {Id.  Book  II.,  Chap,  xix.,  p.  196.) 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  117 

fined  as  the  organized  social  body.  But  has  the 
family  no  sociological  and  political  features  ?  I 
submit  that  it  has.  Human  society  can  be  said 
to  exist  only  when  the  social  condition  is  so  far 
developed  that  social  relations  exist,  not  only  ob- 
jectively as  physical  facts,  but  subjectively  also 
in  the  thought  and  feeling  and  purpose  of  its  as- 
sociated members.  It  is  the  subjective  fact  that 
differentiates  the  human  from  animal  communi- 
ties, that  is,  the  human  family  from  the  family 
of  brutes.  There  is,  there  must  be,  a  subjective 
thought,  feeling  and  purpose  in  every  family, 
otherwise  the  family,  in  spite  of  its  objective 
side,  becomes  a  mere  aggregation  of  accidental 
physical  relationships.  Look  at  the  history  of 
the  Hebrews ;  it  is  not  so  much  the  objective 
side  of  their  life  as  the  subjective  that  has  held, 
yes,  that  does  hold,  that  great  people  together. 

But  has  the  family  no  political  side?  Cer- 
tainly. The  gentes  of  Kome  had,  and  so  has 
every  individual  family  had  that  has  arisen  to 
greatness  since  the  world  began.  There  is  ex 
necessitate  an  organization  in  the  family  life, 
there  is  a  head,  and  the  father  is  that  head.  We 
must  admit,  of  course,  that  the  family  has  only 
an  embryonic  organization;  it  is  not  highly 
organized  like  the  state,  still  it  will  not  do  to 
say  that  it  has  no  trace  of  the  political  in  it, 
and  therefore  that  it  could  not  have  been  the 


118  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

source  of  the  state  and  its  permanent  type  and 
symbol.^ 

The  difference  between  a  new  state  and  a  new 
government  is  not  easy  to  determine,  for  no 
principle  can  be  stated  that  will  invariably  mark 
it.  We  know,  for  instance,  that  a  new  state  was 
made  on  the  North  American  continent  after  the 
war  of  the  colonies  with  Great  Britain,  but  we 
are  not  sure  whether  the  constitution  of  the 
Union,  adopted  in  the  year  1787,  created  a  new 
state  or  a  new  government  for  the  former  Con- 
federation. It  is  probable  that  a  new  state  was 
created,  but  the  question  was  not  settled  until  at 
the  close  of  the  war  of  the  rebellion,  when  it  was 
decided  that  the  sovereignty  of  the  different 
states  of  the  Union  never  had  any  existence  as 
against  that  of  the  United  States.  The  doctrine 
of  *'  state  sovereignty  "  has  since  passed  into  ob- 
livion. On  the  other  hand,  we  do  know  that, 
when  the  German  Empire  was  formed  in  the 
year  1871,  a  new  state  arose  into  existence  out 
of  the  unification  of  the  former  members  of  the 
old  Confederation  with  the  South  German  states. 
We  see  also  that  the  men  of  1870  and  1871  in- 
tended to  create  a  new  empire  and  not  to  revive 

'  That  there  was  very  little  family  life  in  the  Spartan  state 
does  not  disturb  us  ;  that  state  was  anomalous,  and  it  never 
exhibited  the  best  points  of  a  political  life  ;  it  was  merely  a 
fighting  machine. 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  119 

"the  Holy  Eoman  Empire  of  the  German  peo- 
ple." Again,  we  perceive  that  neAv  states  have 
arisen,  and  have  passed  away,  in  Italy  with  each 
successive  generation  for  many  hundred  years ; 
but  that  only  new  governments  have  come  into 
existence  in  Spain  since  the  days  of  the  unity  of 
that  kingdom  under  Ferdinand  and  Isabella. 
The  question  cannot  be  stated  philosophically  ; 
it  must  be  looked  at  historically  and  a  judgment 
given  after  all  the  facts  have  been  taken  into 
consideration.  The  nearest  approach  to  a  prin- 
ciple of  determination  is  the  question :  has  a  new 
sovereignty  come  into  existence  out  of  the  union 
or  subjection  of  older  sovereignties,  or  it  may  be, 
out  of  entirely  new  elements  of  political  life  ? 

It  is  impossible  for  us  to  picture  in  a  short 
sketch  the  rise  of  all,  or  of  any,  of  the  pres- 
ent states  of  Christendom.  It  could  be  done, 
though  not  as  easily  as  that  of  the  State  of 
Watauga,  which  Mr.  Koosevelt^  has  so  graphic- 
ally described.  But  the  making  of  England 
and  the  beginnings  of  E'eAV  England  have  each 
been  drawn  by  competent  and  loving  hands. 
What  I  desire  is  to  study  with  you,  for  the  re- 
maining time  I  have,  the  origin  of  all  the  states 
of  our  western  civilization  collectively :  To  go 
back,  that  is,  to  the  breaking  up  of  the  Roman 
Empire  and  the  rise  of  the  so-called  mediaeval 

»  (The  Winning  of  the  West,  Vol.  I.,  Chap,  vii.,  p.  184,  et  seq.) 


120  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

states.  The  Eoman  Empire,  as  you  know,  em- 
braced within  its  dominion  all  of  the  ancient 
sources  of  our  political  life,  the  Greeks  and  the 
Hebrews,  as  well  as  the  Romans  themselves. 
These  last  created  an  empire  that  was  conter- 
minous with  the  known  civilization  of  the  world, 
that  seemed  to  have  within  it  the  elements  of 
eternity.  It  is  not  necessary  to  ascertain  the 
causes  which  produced  the  decline  and  fall  of  the 
Empire  and  of  the  Romanized  states  which  suc- 
ceeded it;  we  are  familiar  with  them  all  to  a 
greater  or  less  degree ;  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that 
they  were  social  rather  than  political,  for  the 
political  power  of  Rome  was  undoubtedly  better 
organized  and  better  administered  in  the  later, 
than  in  the  earlier  days  of  the  Empire  ;  nor  were 
there  wanting,  even  to  the  end,  many  brave  and 
noble  hearts  to  lead  the  armies  to  the  defence  of 
the  boundaries  of  Rome.  But  for  the  most  part 
the  strength  of  the  classical  peoples  had  been 
sapped  by  indulgence  and  excesses,  by  a  profli- 
gacy and  a  wantonness,  to  which  only  the  pen 
of  a  Farrar  or  of  a  Sienkiewicz  can  do  justice. 
Progress  ceased  in  the  western  world  after  the 
time  of  Constantine,  and  all  the  vast  energy  of 
the  early  Romans  died.  Civilization  was  brought 
up  to  a  certain  point,  but  beyond  it  neither  Rome 
nor  the  Romanized  nations  seemed  to  have  been 
able  to  carry  it.     We  are  not  to  understand  that 


TEE  MODERN  STATE.  121 

there  was  no  chance  of  recovery  for  the  Roman 
world ;  there  was  a  leaven  at  work  which  would 
undoubtedly  have  regenerated  the  Western,  as 
it  did  the  Eastern  Empire,  but  the  opportunity 
was  not  afforded  it ;  I  mean,  of  course,  the 
leaven  of  Christianity.  The  Germans,  who  had 
been  hammering  at  the  gates  on  the  Rhine  and 
Danube  ever  since  the  days  of  the  early  Caesars, 
watching  for  an  unguarded  moment  to  rush  in 
and  sack  and  destroy,  now  attacked  the  Empire 
with  greater  frequency  and  boldness,  using  the 
very  discipline  that  they  had  learned  in  their 
conflicts  with  Rome  eventually  to  overcome  her 
power. 

The  year  a.  d.  476  is  generally  fixed  as  the 
date  that  marks  the  close  of  ancient  history,  and 
the  knell  of  the  ancient  state.  It  was  in  that 
year  that  Odoacer  extinguished  the  title  and 
office  of  Emperor  of  the  West,  and  assuming  the 
title  of  Patrician,  ruled  over  Italy,  nominally  as 
vicar  of  the  Eastern  Emperor,  but  in  reality  as  a 
German  king.  At  this  time  all  the  provinces  of 
the  West  were  occupied  or  about  to  be  occupied  by 
Teutonic  chieftains,  some  faintly  acknowledging 
the  supremacy  of  the  empire,  others  repudiating 
any  and  all  dependence  upon  it.  With  the  break- 
ing up  of  the  Empire  of  the  West,  the  east  and  the 
west  parted  company,  and  the  development  of 
our  so-called  western  civilization  began.     Out  of 


122  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

this  civilization  have  grown  the  states  which  we 
now  see  in  the  world.  There  are  no  states  to- 
day that  were  in  existence  so  long  an  age  ago, 
but  there  are  many  which  run  back  and  rest  upon 
some  of  the  foundations  of  those  which  were  then 
laid.  Indeed,  all  of  the  modern  states  of  the 
west  have  for  their  beginning  the  forces  and 
things  which  were  existent  when  the  great  uni- 
versal city-state  of  antiquity  ceased  to  exist. 

What  are  these  forces  and  things  ?  The  ele- 
mental ones  are  four  in  number :  the  forms  of 
government  and  the  body  of  law  of  the  old 
world-empire;  the  arts  and  culture  that  it  had 
acquired  from  Greece ;  the  new  blood  and  inde- 
pendent ideas  of  the  invading  Germanic  peoples ; 
and  the  inspiring  influence  and  powerful  ideals 
of  Christianity.  Let  me  say  a  word  in  regard  to 
the  first  three  of  these  chief  forces  and  things. 
Of  the  last,  of  Christianity  as  an  inspiring  in- 
fluence and  impelling  power  of  our  modern  civi- 
lization, I  shall  speak  later  on. 

Kome,  it  has  often  been  remarked,  was  defi- 
cient in  comparison  with  Greece,  on  the  intel- 
lectual and  artistic  sides  of  life.  We  could  not 
afford  to  be  without  the  Latin  literature,  some  of 
it  is  of  the  highest  order ;  yet  on  the  whole,  the 
literature  of  Eome  lacks  originality  and  power. 
And  the  same  thing  can  be  said  of  Eoman  art 
an(J  science  and  philosophy.     All  the  Romans 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  123 

who  achieved  distinction  in  these  departments 
were  students  of  the  Greeks.  They  annotated, 
expounded  and  put  in  practice  the  things  that 
the  Greeks  taught  them.  The  great  work  of 
Rome  for  civilization  was  political  and  legal. 
The  world  had  no  conception  of  an  universal 
civil  law  until  Eome  hammered  out  her  magnifi- 
cent system.  It  is  to  be  observed  that  the  Ro- 
mans themselves,  in  the  beginning,  had  no  idea 
of  a  civil  law  which  could  be  useful  for  others 
than  Romans,  that  is,  patricians ;  but  gradually, 
through  their  finding  of  a  jus  gentium,  and  the 
confounding  of  it  with  the  jus  naturale  of  phi- 
losophy, their  civil  law  became  more  and  more 
humane,  until  at  last,  by  the  influence  of  the 
leges,  the  edicts  of  the  Praetors,  and  the  phi- 
losophy of  the  Stoics,  it  grew  to  be  not  only  the 
most  comprehensive,  but  the  one  body  of  civil 
law  that  the  world  knew.  It  is  remarkable,  as 
Sir  Henry  Maine  observes,  that  the  most  cele- 
brated system  of  jurisprudence  known  to  the 
world,  began  and  ended  with  a  code. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  us  to  glance  at  the  laws 
of  Rome,  as  expressed  in  the  Twelve  Decemviral 
Tables ;  the  statutes  of  those  old  days  would  be 
of  no  greater  significance  than  those  of  any  other 
Latin  or  Grecian  city,  were  it  not  for  their  af- 
ter development  in  the  expansion  of  the  people 
and  power  of  Rome.     It  is  the  resjponsa  j^ruden- 


124  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

ti'um,  and  the  treatises  of  the  great  Eoman 
lawyers  and  jurisconsults,  which  enlarged  and  de- 
veloped the  body  of  the  law  along  the  lines,  and 
by  the  means,  which  I  have  already  indicated. 
Some  of  the  results  of  these  respoTisa  and  com- 
mentaries were  put  into  special  leges^  some  were 
embodied  in  the  perpetual  edict  of  the  Praetors, 
and  some  were  to  be  found  only  in  institutes 
and  treatises  for  students.  For  a  long  number 
of  years  the  Eoman  law  was  in  a  chaotic  condi- 
tion, as  the  English  common  law  is  now ;  but 
finally,  under  Justinian,  the  w^hole  body  of  law, 
both  of  civil  law  and  of  equity,  was  reformed, 
and  these  two  great  branches  of  jurisprudence 
were  fused  into  one  body,  the  Corpus  Juris 
Civilis.  It  is  the  Corpus  Juris  Civilis  which  is 
the  basis  of  the  civil  law  of  Europe  to-day.  It 
was  the  recovery  of  the  Pandects,  and  the  study 
and  application  of  the  rules  and  principles 
therein  found,  in  the  University  of  Bologna  in 
the  twelfth  century,  that  gave  the  impetus  to 
the  development  of  law  and  of  the  science  of 
jurisprudence  and  government  that  made  pos- 
sible the  growth  and  development  of  the  modern 
aCates  of  Europe. 

(  I  cannot  stop  now  to  point  out  the  fact  that  it 
was  Eome  that  taught  the  world  how  to  govern 
the  world.  Full  of  abuses,  indeed,  was  the  Eo- 
man imperial  system  of  the  government  of  dio- 


TEE  MODERN  STATE,  125 

ceses  and  provinces,  of  cities  and  parishes,  but  its 
system  became  the  system  of  the  church,  and  its 
officers  the  pattern  of  the  officers  of  the  church, 
and  the  church  was  the  instructor  of  the  barbaric 
kingdoms  which  were  erected  upon  the  remnants 
of  the  empire.  Theodoric  continued  in  opera- 
tion in  the  Ostrogothic  kingdom  of  Italy  not 
only  the  Eoman  law  but  the  judicial  tribunals 
and  the  administrative  system  of  Kome.  And 
Clovis,  when  he  founded  the  kingdom  of  the 
Franks,  brought  the  Komans  and  the  Germans 
together  upon  equal  terms,  using  the  institutions 
and  systems  of  both  as  he  found  one  or  the  other 
convenient  for  his  government.  Charlemagne 
continued  in  the  same  way  and  established  his 
empire  on  the  old  lines,  endeavoring  to  keep 
both  NJihe  institutions  and  the  traditions  of 
Eome.  ] 

I  have  spoken  of  the  fact  that  the  arts  and 
culture  of  Greece  were  adopted  by  the  Eomans, 
and  became  the  dominant  and  only  form  in  the 
civilization  of  the  ancient  world.  It  would  take 
a  treatise  to  show  this  fully,  but  it  is  not  neces- 
sary ;  the  work  of  the  Greeks  in  literature  and 
in  art  is  too  well  understood  to  need  more  than 
a  passing  notice.  Greek  thought,  it  is  conceded, 
lies  at  the  foundation  of  all  modern  speculation, 
and  Aristotle  and  Plato  are  still  revered  as  the 
great  masters  of  the  educated.    All  the  problems 


12(5  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  life  were  directly  or  indirectly  attacked  by 
the  Greeks,  and  their  varying  solutions  were 
formulated  before  the  close  of  their  intellectual 
activity  in  many  splendid  systems  of  philosophy. 
These  systems  of  thought  of  the  Greeks  furnished 
the  Komans  with  their  philosophical  beliefs,  and 
affected  deeply  the  speculative  theology  of  the 
Christian  church  ;  indeed,  without  them  and  the 
finely  wrought  language  of  Greece,  the  JN'icene 
Creed  and  many  Christian  dogmas  which  we 
now  have  would  not  have  been  formulated,  as 
there  would  have  existed  no  proper  means  of  ex- 
pressing them. 

The  science  of  the  Greeks  did  not  in  any  way 
equal  their  philosophy.  Aristotle,  it  is  true, 
pointed  out  the  right  way  to  knowledge,  the  way 
that  Lord  Bacon  afterward  showed  more  clearly ; 
but  the  Greeks  preferred  to  speculate  rather  than 
to  investigate.  The  art  and  the  poetry  of  Greece, 
on  the  other  hand,  have  been  as  permanent  as  its 
philosophy.  At  no  time  and  under  no  circum- 
stances have  the  conception  of  the  beautiful,  and 
the  power  of  the  expression  of  truth  and  beauty 
in  the  world  of  nature  and  men,  been  so  great 
and  so  marvelous  as  it  was  in  Athens  in  the  time 
of  Pericles.  ^'  In  art  we  may  maintain  without 
the  smallest  fear  of  contradiction,"  says  Dr.  Ma- 
haffy,  "  that  the  modern  world,  with  all  its  inven- 
tions, has  not  even  approached  the  perfection  of 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  127 

this  golden  age."  ^  The  buildings  on  the  Acrop- 
olis were  certainly  the  most  beautiful  and  per- 
fect in  the  world. 

And  what  shall  we  say  of  the  poetry  of  Greece, 
of  the  epic,  lyric  and  tragic  muse,  whose  songs 
have  never  ceased  to  be  heard  in  the  ears  of  men  ? 
The  poetry  and  the  art  of  Greece  seem  to  have 
had  very  little  to  do  with  the  foundation  and  de- 
velopment of  the  state.  They  certainly  had  no 
direct  bearing  upon  the  political  side  of  man's 
life,  but  indirectly  they  have  exercised  an  im- 
mense influence,  for  they  go  to  make  up  the  sweet 
and  pleasant  side  of  the  social  life  of  mankind, 
out  of  which,  and  because  of  which,  the  political 
is  so  finely  organized.  As  I  have  already  said, 
Kome  had  no  art  and  no  philosophy  and  but  lit- 
tle culture  of  her  own ;  she  borrowed  and  adapted 
those  of  her  more  highly  gifted  neighbor. 

Of  the  third  great  factor  in  the  building  up  of 
the  modern  state,  of  the  Teutonic  peoples,  I  must 
speak  at  greater  length.  We  have  ceased  to  re- 
gard the  "  barbarians  who  broke  down  the  Em- 
pire as  constitutional  noblemen  traveling  incog- 
nito,"^ and  have  grown  a  little  sceptical  of 
the  assurance  that  the  German  writers  so  con- 
stantly give  us  that  men's  first  ideas  of  constitu- 
tional freedom  arose  in  the  depths  of  the  dark 

1  (A  Survey  of  Greek  Civilization,  Chap,  v.,  p.  149.) 

■^  (Nash,  Genesis  of  the  Social  Conscience,  Chap,  vi.,  p.  185.) 


128  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

forests  of  their  fatherland,  and  that  they  have 
developed  by  means  of  their  own  inherent  strength 
into  the  splendid  civil  liberty  of  our  age.  The 
fact  is,  as  we  can  observe  everywhere,  savage  and 
uncivilized  peoples  are  apt  to  be  tenacious  of  their 
freedom,  and  to  have  many  customs  and  institu- 
tions which  establish  and  protect  it ;  it  was  so  in 
an  especial  way  with  the  Korth  American  In- 
dians ;  still,  we  must  not  ignore  that  the  iron  rule 
of  Rome  and  the  almost  universal  prevalence  of 
slavery  had  well-nigh  extinguished  the  idea  of 
personal  liberty  in  the  ancient  world,  and  that 
the  high  Teutonic  ideals  of  personal  independ- 
ence, and  of  the  value  of  man,  as  compared  with 
the  state,  have  been  of  inestimable  benefit  in  the 
remodeling  of  society  and  in  the  rebuilding  of  the 
state  and  government.  Somewhere,  at  some 
time,  between  the  ancient  days  and  the  present, 
the  thought  of  the  relation  of  men  to  the  state 
has  become  transformed.  In  ancient  days  the 
state  was  all-in-all,  and  men  existed  but  for  its 
welfare ;  to-day  man  is  of  the  first  importance, 
and  the  state  exists  for  the  good  of  all.  In  the 
philosophy  of  Eousseau  it  is  said  that  the  state 
now  exists  for  the  benefit  of  the  individual,  but 
as  has  already  been  shown,  mankind  does  not  live 
as  units,  but  as  members  of  the  family,  and  in 
family  relations.  It  will  not  do  to  say  that  the 
German  ideals  of  freedom  wholly  produced  the 


THE  MODERN  STATE.  129 

change  we  have  noted.  Christianity  had  an 
equal,  if  not  a  greater,  influence  in  such  produc- 
tion. We  must  say  that  Christianity  and  the 
Germanic  ideals  worked  together  to  this  great 
end.  The  feeling  was  Germanic,  the  force  was 
Christian. 

The  great  contribution  of  the  Teutonic  peoples 
to  the  state  was  the  institutions  out  of  which 
arose  the  forms  of  constitutional  government. 
The  assemblies  of  the  Koman  Kepublic  gradually 
died  away;  and,  besides,  these  assemblies  were 
only  of  a  city,  and  not  of  a  province  or  of  a  king- 
dom, and  were  never  representative  in  character. 
The  political  arrangement  of  the  primitive  Ger- 
mans as  drawn  by  Tacitus,  were  those  of  the 
primitive  Greeks  as  shown  by  Homer,  and  were 
closely  allied ;  but  while  the  classical  nations,  start- 
ing from  the  same  beginning,  failed  to  create  en- 
during free  governments  and  ended  in  an  uni- 
versal despotism,  the  Teutonic  peoples,  or  better, 
the  nations  which  gained  an  infusion  of  Teutonic 
blood,  fought  their  way  through  an  era  of  abso- 
lute monarchy,  and  passed  on  to  the  stage  of  con- 
stitutional government  and  liberty.  The  work 
of  Christianity  for  the  state  in  this  great  devel- 
opment has  been,  as  I  believe,  ignored ;  it  will  be 
my  purpose  to  show  how  much  it  has  done  for 
the  state  in  my  next  lecture.  But  one  thing  of 
the  Germans  can  be  justly  said ;  their  institutions 


130  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

formed  the  moulds  through  which  the  newer  and 
better  organization  of  the  state  has  passed. 
After  all,  ideas  are  old.  The  Greeks  and  the 
Romans  had  thought  out  and  put  into  practice 
in  one  way  or  another  most  of  the  political  no- 
tions we  now  have.  What  the  world  needed  at 
the  breaking  up  of  the  Empire  and  the  influx  of 
the  Germans  into  the  then  civilized  world,  was  a 
new  motive  and  some  new  blood.  Christianity 
furnished  the  motive,  the  Germans  the  blood. 
Their  greatest  contribution  to  the  development 
of  the  modern  state  was  themselves. 


LECTUEE  lY. 

THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

We  have  seen  in  a  previous  lecture  that  the 
ancient  state  was  founded  directly  upon  a  reli- 
gious basis,  and  that  religious  rites  and  ceremonies 
were  ever  associated  with  the  laws  of  the  state 
and  with  the  rules  of  action  of  its  many  different 
organs.  The  ancient  state  had  no  conception  of 
a  dualism  between  civil  and  religious  life  such  as 
we  have ;  it  had  no  idea  whatsoever  of  a  church 
as  distinct  from  the  state.  Keligion,  or,  perhaps 
it  would  be  better  to  say,  the  religious  feeling  of 
the  men  of  antiquity  prescribed  that  the  hearth, 
which  they  held  to  be  the  centre  of  all  worship, 
should  always  have  a  priest.  The  house  had  a 
hearth  and  a  priest,  who  was  always  the  father 
of  the  family.  The  phratry  had  a  hearth  and  a 
priest,  who  was  the  phratriarch ;  and  the  city  had 
a  hearth  and  it  had  its  supreme  priest,  who  bore 
the  name  king.  Sometimes  they  gave  other  titles 
to  their  king.  As  he  was  especially  the  priest  of 
the  prytaneum  or  public  hall  of  the  city,  the 
Greeks  called  him  pr3^tanis,  and  sometimes  they 
called  him  archon  or  ruler.     Under  the  different 

131 


132  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

names  of  prytanis,  archon  and  king  we  see  a  per- 
sonage who,  whatever  else  his  office  may  have 
been,  was  above  all  the  chief  of  public  worship. 
He  kept  up  the  fire,  he  oifered  the  sacrifice,  he 
pronounced  the  prayer  and  he  presided  at  the  reli- 
gious repasts  of  the  community.^  And  so  when 
we  find  Agamemnon  sacrificing  for  the  whole 
host,  we  are  in  no  ways  surprised,  for  we  know 
that  the  kingly  and  the  priestly  offices,  among  the 
peoples  of  antiquity  were  originally  one,  and  that 
it  was  only  gradually  that  they  became  separated, 
as  necessity  required,  or  as  certain  kingly  families 
became  reduced  to  the  ranks  of  the  people,  who, 
losing  their  rights  of  ruling,  yet  retained  their 
rights  of  sacrificing,  possessing  the  secrets  of  cer- 
emony and  ritual. 

In  Koman  history  we  find  the  kingly  and  the 
priestly  offices  combined  in  Romulus,  the  founder 
of  the  city ;  and  we  see  them  united  in  the  most 
significant  way  in  Numa,  the  second  ruler,  who 
was  more  priest  than  king.  It  was  Kuma  who 
established  and  ordered  the  religious  ceremonies 
of  the  growing  state.  He  appointed  many  to 
minister  in  sacred  things,  such  as  the  pontiffs, 
who  were  to  see  that  all  things  relating  to  the 
gods  were  duly  observed  by  all ;  the  augurs,  who 
taught  men  the  pleasure  of  the  gods  concerning 

'(De  Coulanges,  The  Ancient  City,  Book  III.,  Chap,  ix.,  p. 
231.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  133 

things  to  come ;  and  the  flamens,  who  ministered 
in  the  temple.  Livy  tells  us  that  he  did  these 
things  because  he  foresaw  that  his  successors 
would  often  have  wars  to  maintain  and  would 
not  be  able  to  take  care  of  the  sacrifices.  But 
whatever  was  his  reason,  we  see  that  the  Koman 
priesthood  was  an  emanation  from  primitive  roy- 
alty, and  we  see  also  why  it  was  that  the  noblest 
of  the  Eomans  coveted  the  position  of  Pontifex 
Maximus^  the  head  of  the  college  of  the  pontiffs. 
During  the  empire  the  functions  of  Pontifex 
Maximus  were  discharged  by  the  emperors,  who 
reserved  to  themselves  the  title.  It  is  a  curiosity 
of  history  that  the  name  survived  even  the  estab- 
lishment of  Christianity  as  a  state  religion.  After 
it  was  dropped  by  the  emperors  it  was  taken  up 
by  the  popes. 

In  the  distinctively  theocratic  state  of  Judah, 
as  I  have  shown,  the  priestly  and  the  kingly 
offices  were  separated,  except  in  later  years  under 
the  Maccabean  kings.  The  priestly  office  was 
the  first  to  be  established  and  the  last  to  be  de- 
stroyed ;  yet,  though  there  was  this  separation  in 
the  offices  of  the  commonwealth  of  Judah,  we 
must  not  understand  that  there  was  any  antago- 
nism between  them,  such  as  we  see  arise  between 
the  civil  and  the  priestly  powers  in  the  middle 
ages.  There  was  no  secular  side  to  the  life  of 
the  Jewish  people  whatsoever;  all  was  sacred, 


134  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

and  the  king  regarded  himself  as  much  the  min- 
ister of  Jehovah  as  did  the  High-Priest,  each  1;^ 
his  own  sphere  of  action.  Of  course,  as  we  know, 
differences  sometimes  arose,  but  this  was  when 
certain  kings  or  certain  priests  were  not  true  to 
the  Law  and  the  genius  of  Israel ;  who  were,  in 
fact,  apostates  from  the  commonwealth  of  Jeho- 
vah. The  status  of  religion  and  government  in 
the  kingdom  of  Judah  was  analogous  to  that  of 
the  church  and  state  in  England  from  the  time  of 
the  Eeformation  to  our  day.  The  church  in  Eng- 
land, or  as  it  is  termed  specifically,  '*  the  Church 
of  England  as  by  law  established,"  is  older  than 
the  kingdom,  and  the  office  of  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury  antedates  that  of  the  king  by  several 
centuries ;  yet  his  power  is  not  superior  to,  but 
rather  is  it  subservient  to  the  royal  power,  as  the 
power  of  the  Aaronic  priesthood  became  subserv- 
ient to  that  of  the  house  of  David. 

Marcus  Yarro,  whom  Cicero  calls  without  any 
doubt  the  most  learned  of  the  Komans,  divided 
the  theology  of  the  classical  peoples  into  three 
kinds,  namely,  the  mythical,  the  physical  and  the 
civil.  He  says :  "  They  call  that  kind  mythical 
which  the  poets  chiefly  use ;  physical,  that  which 
the  philosophers  use ;  civil,  that  which  the  peo- 
ple use."  ^    "We  have  not  time  to  dwell  upon  the 

1  (St.  Augustine,  The  City  of  God,  Book  VI.,  Sec.  5,  p.  238, 
Dods'  Translation.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  135 

mythical  and  the  physical,  but  let  us  look  at  the 
civil  theology  of  Yarro.  "  The  third  kind,"  says 
he,  "  is  that  which  citizens  in  cities,  and  especially 
the  priests,  ought  to  know  and  to  administer. 
From  it  is  to  be  known  what  god  each  one  may  suit- 
ably worship,  what  sacred  rites  and  sacrifices  each 
one  may  suitably  perform."  ^  And  this  distinction 
we  must  always  keep  in  mind  when  we  think  of 
the  religion  or  religions  of  Greece  and  Kome.  The 
poets  were  continually  imagining  things  about 
the  gods,  and  most  of  their  imaginings  were  evil, 
so  evil,  indeed,  that  Plato  wanted  to  banish  the 
poets  from  his  ideal  republic.  The  philosophers 
were  ever  trying  to  find  analogies  between  nature 
and  human  reason,  which  would  answer  the  long- 
ings of  men's  hearts  for  the  divine ;  some  of 
which  findings  went  far  to  anticipate  the  truths 
revealed  by  Christ  concerning  the  Godhead.  The 
civil  authorities  and  the  priests  accepted  the  tra- 
ditions of  the  past  and  cared  for  and  cultivated 
the  civil  rites  and  ceremonies,  which  constituted 
the  religion  of  the  state,  and  were  held  to  pre- 
serve its  life,  and  to  secure  its  welfare.  It  is  dif- 
ficult, of  course,  to  distinguish  between  these 
three  kinds  of  theologies,  and  especially  between 
the  mythical  and  the  civil,  as  St.  Augustine  him- 
self has  so  graphically  pointed  out ;  but  the  dis- 
tinction existed,  and  was  a  part  of  the  religious 

'(i<^.,  p.  240.) 


136  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

consciousness  of  the  peoples  of  Greece  and  Eome ; 
but  mark,  it  was  precisely  on  account  of  the  con- 
fusion between  the  mythical  and  the  civil,  that 
the  civil  authorities  were  willing  to  harbor  every 
new  kind  of  cultus  or  religion ;  that  Athens  set 
up  an  altar  to  the  (or  an)  Unknown  God,  and 
that  Kome  admitted  any  god  to  her  Pantheon 
which  did  not  immediately  seek  to  subvert  and 
overthrow  the  standing  of  the  others. 

It  would  be  impossible  here  to  tell  the  state  of 
religion,  or  better,  the  status  of  the  religions  of 
Eome  at  the  time  of  the  founding  of  the  church 
of  Christ.  There  was  the  old  civil  religion  which 
was  ordered  by  l^uma  and  was  bound  up  with 
the  life  of  the  city-state,  and  there  were  an  hun- 
dred different  others,  some  that  had  come  from 
Greece  (though  these  were  similar  to  the  myth- 
ical rites  that  had  grown  up  indigenously  in 
Kome),  others  that  had  come  from  Egypt  and 
the  orient,  that  had  no  relation  or  connection 
whatever  with  classical  thought.  The  worship 
of  Isis  was  very  popular,  but  that  of  Mithra  was 
more  so,  and  even  threatened  at  one  time  to  be- 
come a  rival  of  Christianity.  And  all  these 
different  systems  of  religious  belief  and  worship 
of  the  empire  were  tolerant  of  one  another,  all, 
of  course,  except  the  cultus  of  the  Jews,  which 
could  not  and  would  not  allow  that  any  worship 
other  than  that  of  the  one,  almighty,  self -existent 


THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH.  137 

God,  their  Jehovah,  was  right.  And  it  was  pre- 
cisely because  of  this  attitude  of  the  Jews  that 
the  devotees  of  the  other  gods  and  goddesses 
hated  them  and  combined  against  them  and 
persecuted  them  without  mercy. 

Christ  came  into  the  world,  was  born,  as  we 
believe,  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  of  the  tribe  of 
Judah,  of  the  people  of  Abraham,  and  He  was, 
as  we  know,  the  supreme  religious  teacher  of  the 
world.  Let  us  first  see  whether  we  can  find  any 
inevitable  antagonism  between  the  teachings  of 
Christ  and  the  traditions  of  the  Jews  in  regard 
to  the  relations  of  religion  and  life  to  one  another. 
Then  let  us  see  why  the  Jewish  church  opposed 
its  Messiah  and  crucified  Him ;  and  then  let  us 
study  how  an  antagonism  arose  between  the  re- 
ligion and  church  of  Christ  and  the  religions  and 
government  of  the  empire. 

At  the  time  when  Christ  came  into  the  world 
there  was  a  decided  breach  between  state  and 
church  among  the  Jews.  The  power  of  govern- 
ment, or,  as  we  may  say,  the  civil  authority,  was 
vested  in  the  Emperor  and  his  lieutenants,  and 
the  direction  of  religion,  the  ecclesiastical  au- 
thority, was  vested  in  the  High-Priest  and  the 
Sanhedrim.  What  did  Christ  proclaim  ?  A  new 
method  of  worship  ?  A  new  form  and  manner 
of  government?  Not  precisely.  Christ  taught 
that  religion  is  not  so  much  a  matter  of  outward 


138  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

form  and  observance,  but  rather  that  it  has  to  do 
with  the  inner  motive  of  men.  Secondly,  He 
')  showed  men  whom  they  were  to  worship ;  not  a 
■  mass  of  gods  and  goddesses,  mythical,  physical 
and  civil,  but  one,  the  eternal  Godhead ;  the 
universal  Father,  the  omnipotent  Saviour  and 
the  unfailing  Sanctifier  of  all  who  seek  after 
Him.  Thirdly,  He  pointed  out  that  He,  the 
Saviour  of  men,  had  come  to  establish  a  king- 
dom, not  of  force  by  force,  but  of  righteousness 
by  righteousness.  The  ancient  pagan  religions, 
we  must  understand,  had  nothing  whatever  to 
do  with  the  morals  of  their  devotees,  strange  as 
it  may  seem,  and  all  as  incomprehensible  as  it  is 
to  us  since  Christ  taught  the  world. 

The  pagan  religions  were  simply  concerned  with 
securing  the  favor  of  this  or  that  god  or  goddess, 
or  in  propitiating  this  or  that  one  because  of  some 
misfortune  or  mischance  that  had  come  upon 
men  or  the  state.  Men  resorted  to  the  philoso- 
phers for  moral  teaching  and  for  the  precepts 
which  we  now  hold  to  be  the  essential  things  of 
religion.  It  is  Christ  that  taught  the  world  the 
blessedness  of  a  religious,  that  is  to  say,  of  a 
moral  character.  Not  that  He  was  the  first  that 
taught  this  great  truth,  for  many  of  the  prophets 
of  Israel  had  proclaimed  what  were  the  essential 
things  of  religion,  and  notably  Micah.  God 
"  hath  showed  thee,  O  man,  what  is  good :  and 


TBE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCB.  139 

what  doth  the  Lord  require  of  thee,  but  to  do 
justly  and  to  love  mercy  and  to  walk  humbly 
with  thy  God."  ^  Yet  the  Jews,  as  all  the  rest 
of  the  world  of  antiquity,  laid  the  chief  stress 
in  religion  upon  rites  and  ceremonies,  endeavor- 
ing to  keep  all  the  minor  ordinances  of  the  law 
blamelessly,  even  to  the  tithing  of  "mint  and 
anise  and  cummin,"  and  neglecting  its  vital,  es- 
sential principles.  It  needed  the  authoritative 
teaching  of  Christ,  of  one  sent  from  God,  to 
show  the  Jews,  and  all  mankind  as  well,  that 
"judgment  and  mercy  and  faith"  are  the 
weightier  matters  of  religion,  and  that  though 
ceremonial  observances  ought  to  be  fulfilled,  yet 
that  they,  without  the  weightier  matters,  are  but 
as  chaff  before  the  wind. 

But  what  was  the  attitude  of  Christ  toward 
the  church  and  the  state  ?  That  is  the  question 
with  which  we  are  now  concerned.  In  the  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount  Christ  said  of  Himself,  "I 
came  not  to  destroy  "  the  law  or  the  prophets, 
"  but  to  fulfil."  ^  And  again  He  said,  "  Except 
your  righteousness  shall  exceed  the  righteousness 
of  the  scribes  and  Pharisees,  ye  shall  in  no  wise 
enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven."  ^  By  these 
words  we  understand  that  Christ's  attitude  toward 
the  church  was  the  friendly  attitude  of  a  reformer 

» (vi.  8,  K.  v.)  2  (St.  Matthew  v.  17,  E.  V.) 

3(i<^.,  20,  E.  V.) 


140  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

and  not  the  antagonistic  attitude  of  a  destroyer. 
He  declared  that  the  moral  truths  which  were 
embodied  in  the  law,  and  which  had  been  re- 
iterated again  and  again  by  the  prophets,  should 
be  carried  into  effect,  and  He  showed  that  right- 
eousness consists  in  such  observance  and  not  in 
the  observance  of  ceremonies  great  and  small. 
And  again,  Christ  said,  "The  scribes  and  the 
Pharisees  sits  on  Moses'  seat:  all  things  there- 
fore whatsoever  they  bid  you,  these  do  and  ob- 
serve ;  but  do  not  ye  after  their  works."  ^  Here 
is  no  intention  to  push  these  teachers  of  morality 
from  their  stools,  but  rather  is  there  a  commenda- 
tion of  their  teachings,  but  not  of  their  actions. 

But  what  was  the  attitude  of  Christ  toward  the 
priesthood  of  Israel,  toward,  that  is,  the  organized 
church  ?  It  was  undoubtedly  antagonistic.  There 
was  certainly  a  manifest  intention  to  set  it  aside. 
We  see  this  first  negatively,  and  then  positively. 
We  see  this  negatively  in  that  Christ  never  com- 
mended the  priesthood,  nor  suggested  that  there 
was  any  further  use  for  it.  Positively,  in  that 
Christ  proclaimed  at  the  outset  of  His  preaching, 
the  fact  that  St.  John  Baptist  had  previously 
announced,  that  "the  time  is  fulfilled  and  the 
kingdom  of  God  is  at  hand."  "^  The  sway  of 
the  kingdom  of  God  could  not  be  otherwise 

J  (St.  Matthew  xxiii.  2,  3,  E.  V.) 
»(St.  Marki.  15,  R.  v.) 


THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH.  141 

than  subversive  of  the  rule  of  the  high  prldsts, 
and  the  enmity  of  Annas  and  Caiaphas  and  their 
followers  to  Jesus,  after  they  had  refused  to 
accept  Him  as  their  Messiah,  was  natural.  Just 
how  Christ  would  have  changed  the  religious 
polity  of  the  Jews,  in  such  a  case,  we  cannot  im- 
agine ;  but  we  must  believe  that  the  two  great 
Christian  ordinances  of  Baptism  and  the  Lord's 
Supper  would  have  been  instituted,  and  that  the 
rite  of  circumcision  and  the  bloody  sacrifices 
would  have  been  set  aside;  and  probably  He 
would  have  chosen  twelve  chief  pastors  or  judges 
to  have  governed  the  new  kingdom  of  Israel, 
like  as  He  chose  twelve  apostles  and  sent  them 
forth,  under  different  conditions,  to  bring  the 
kingdoms  of  the  world  into  the  church  of  God. 
But  the  priests  and  rulers  did  not  accept  Jesus  as 
their  Messiah,  and  it  is  a  vain  thing  to  speculate 
upon  what  would  have  occurred  if  they  had  so 
done.  What  we  must  perceive  is  that  Christ  in- 
tended to,  and  that  He  did,  set  aside  the  whole 
religious  polity  of  Israel,  and  that  He  substituted 
another  in  its  place ;  but  that  religious,  that  is, 
moral  laws,  commandments  and  precepts  were  in 
no  wise  changed  or  altered,  rather  that  they 
found  a  fulfilment  in  His  teachings  and  in  His 
great  example. 

The  polity  that  Christ  substituted  in  the  place 
of  the  old  polity  of  Israel  is  the  kingdom  of  God. 


142  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

But  what  is  the  kingdom,  or  as  we  may  say,  the 
city,  or  the  church  of  God  ?  Christ  speaks  con- 
stantly in  His  discourses  of  His  kingdom,  and  He 
says  that  He  is  its  King,  notably  when  questioned 
by  Pontius  Pilate  in  regard  to  His  royal  char- 
acter. But  He  does  not  tell  us  exactly  what  His 
kingdom  is,  or  in  what  it  consists.  He  simply 
says,  "My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world."  "To 
this  end  have  I  been  born,  and  to  this  end  am  I 
come  into  the  world,  that  I  should  bear  witness 
unto  the  truth."  ^  He  allows  us  to  infer  that  the 
kingdom  of  God  is  a  kingdom  or  dominion 
founded  upon  truth,  and  that  truth  has  its  origin 
and  centre  of  influence,  not  in  the  hearts  of  men, 
but  in  the  bosom  of  God.  At  another  time  He 
says,  "I  am  the  truth." ^  He  who  is  the  truth  is 
the  King  of  the  kingdom  of  God.  But  what  was 
the  attitude  of  Christ  toward  the  state,  or  as  we 
may  better  say,  toward  the  civil  authority  ?  It 
was  certainly  friendly.  We  see  this  both  in  His 
answer  to  the  Pharisees  and  Herodians  at  the 
time  when  they  asked  Him  whether  it  were  law- 
ful to  give  tribute  unto  Csesar  or  not  ^  and  also  in 
His  demeanor  when  brought  before  the  judgment 
seat  of  Caesar's  representative  the  morning  of  His 
iniquitous  trial  and  crucifixion.''  It  was  undoubt- 
edly Christ's  words  "to  render  unto  Caesar  the 

^  (St.  John  xviii.  36,  37,  R.  v.)        « (gt.  John  xiv.  6.) 

3  (St.  Matthew  xxii.  21.)  *  (St.  John  xviii.  33.,  et  seq.) 


THE  STATE  AND    THE  CHURCH.  143 

things  that  are  Caesar's  "  and  His  subsequent  sub- 
mission to  the  civil  authority,  that  prompted  the 
Apostle  of  the  Gentiles,  when  writing  to  the  con- 
verts to  Christ  in  Rome,  to  say,  "  let  every  soul 
be  in  subjection  to  the  higher  powers :  for  there  is 
no  power  but  of  God ;  and  the  powers  that  be  are 
ordained  of  God."  ^  And  this  was  the  exact  at- 
titude of  the  church  for  centuries  after  it  had 
been  established  by  Christ,  and  had  gone  forth  to 
bring  the  world  into  subjection  to  Him.  The 
state  was  not  to  be  overthrown  by  the  church, 
nor  were  the  members  of  the  church  to  refuse  it 
obedience,  except  when  its  laws  interfered  with 
the  dictates  of  conscience,  and  sought  to  compel 
the  doing  of  things  that  were  repugnant  to  the 
teachings  of  Christ.  Order  is  the  first  rule  of 
God,  in  heaven  and  in  earth,  and  the  church 
was  not  antagonistic  to  order ;  it  sought  not  to 
subvert  it  but  always  to  uphold  it.  "  Render  " 
therefore,  says  the  apostle,  "  to  all  their  dues : 
tribute  to  whom  tribute  is  due  ;  custom  to  whom 
custom ;  fear  to  whom  fear ;  honor  to  whom 
honor."  ^ 

The  things  to  which  the  Christian  Church  was 
antagonistic  were  the  polytheism  of  the  ancient 
world,  and  its  evil  ways  of  living.  The  question 
now  arises,  why  was  it  then  that  the  Empire  was, 
in  the  beginning,  so  fearful  of  the  church  and  so 

'  (Romans  xiii.  1,  R.  v.)  ^  (Id.,  v.  7.) 


144  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

determined  to  stamp  out  the  sect  of  the  Naza- 
renes?  Certainly  not  because  Christianity  was 
antagonistic  to  the  civil  authority ;  no,  but  be- 
cause it  seemed  to  be.  We  must  remember  that 
there  was  no  difference  between  church  and 
state  in  the  ancient  world.  Keligion,  anyway 
civil  religion,  and  civil  authority,  were  one  and 
the  same  thing.  Christianity  was  necessarily 
antagonistic  to  the  civil  religion  and  seemed  to 
be,  therefore,  to  the  civil  authority,  and  "  the 
powers  that  be  "  believed  that  it  ought  to  be  put 
down  as  subversive  of  the  one  and  the  other. 
There  were  minor  reasons  also,  but  we  need  not 
dwell  upon  them.  One  was  the  strange  and 
wicked  misrepresentation  of  the  worship  of 
Christ  that  floated  about  among  the  ignorant, 
and  another  the  fact  that  His  doctrines,  when 
they  became  known,  reflected  upon  the  ways  of 
living  of  the  classical  peoples,  and  enraged  those 
who  would  not  be  converted  from  their  evil 
doings. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  speak  of  the  reasons  why 
the  church  of  Christ  grew ;  what  we  are  con- 
cerned with  now  is  the  fact  that  the  church  did 
grow,  like  the  famous  grain  of  mustard  seed 
spoken  of  by  its  founder,  and  became  in  three 
short  centuries  the  greatest  institution  of  the 
world,  except  the  world-wide  empire  itself.  I 
speak  of  the  church  as  an  institution ;  and  thus 


TEE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH,  145 

we  must  regard  it.  It  was  an  institution  of 
which  Christ  laid  the  foundation,  and  a  wholly- 
new  thing,  one  the  like  of  which  the  world  had 
never  known  or  dreamed  of  before.  The  fact 
that  Christ  intended  to  found  a  new  institution 
is  plainly  seen  in  more  than  one  passage  of  the 
gospels.  We  see  it  in  His  words  to  Mcodemus : 
"  except  a  man  be  born  anew,  he  cannot  see  the 
kingdom  of  God ; "  Mn  those  to  Peter,  "  upon  this 
rock  "  (the  confession  of  faith  in  Him  as  Christ) 
"  I  will  build  my  church ; "  ^  in  those  to  Pilate, 
"  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world ;  "  (that  is,  not 
founded  upon  the  things  of  this  world)  but  My 
rule  is  that  of  a  ruler  which  necessitates  My  hav- 
ing a  kingdom.^  But  more  especially  do  we  see 
it  in  His  acts ;  in  His  setting  apart  of  the  twelve 
apostles  and  of  the  other  seventy  ;  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  sacraments  of  Baptism  and  of  the 
Lord's  Supper ;  in  His  great  commission  to  His 
apostles  to  go  into  the  world,  to  make  disciples 
of  all  nations,  baptizing  them  in  the  holy  I^ame. 
But  the  main  question  is,  did  our  Lord  intend 
to  found  a  visible  or  an  invisible  kingdom,  for  it 
is  admitted  generally  that  He  did  establish  a 
church.  It  is  impossible  to  go  into  the  argument 
with  any  degree  of  fulness,  nor  is  it  necessary. 
"  It  is  evident  unto  all  men,  diligently  reading 

»  (St.  John  iii.  3,  R.  v.)  « (gt.  Matthew  xvi.  18,  E.  V.) 

3  (St.  John  xviii.  36,  et  seq.  E.  v. ) 


146  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  . 

Holy  Scripture  and  ancient  Authors,  that  from 
the  Apostles'  time  there  have  been  these  Orders 
of  Ministers  in  Christ's  Church, — Bishops,  Priests 
and  Deacons."^  It  is  evident  again  that,  as  we 
watch  the  history  of  the  development  of  Chris- 
tian thought,  we  discover  a  great  number  of  re- 
ligious bodies  all  owing  their  existence  and  their 
purpose  to  Christian  belief  and  Christian  ideas, 
yet  "  in  the  midst  of  these  we  discern  also  some- 
thing incomparably  more  permanent  and  more 
universal — one  great  continuous  body — the  Cath- 
olic Church.  There  it  is ;  none  can  overlook  its 
visible  existence,  let  us  say  from  the  time  when 
Christianity  emerges  out  of  the  gloom  of  the 
sub-apostolic  age  down  to  the  period  of  the  Kef- 
ormation."  ^  It  is  evident,  also,  that  these  bishops, 
priests  and  deacons,  the  ministry  of  the  more  per- 
manent. Catholic  Church,  were  from  the  begin- 
ning a  highly  organized  and  finely  articulated 
body,  visible  to  the  eyes  of  all  who  cared  to  see 
them,  preaching  the  invisible  "Word,  but  minis- 
tering the  visible  sacraments.  Besides  all  which, 
there  is  a  natural  argument  in  favor  of  a  visible 
church.  As  all  the  social  and  political  ideas  of 
men  are  preserved  in  life  and  put  into  effect  in 
the  common  and  universal  organ  of  society  which 
we  call  the  state,  so  we  conclude  that  all  the 

'  (Preface  to  the  Ordinal  in  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer. ) 
'  (Gore,  The  Church  and  the  Ministry,  Chap,  i.,  p.  11.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  147 

moral  and  spiritual  ideas  which  are  the  offspring 
of  Christianity  should  be  preserved  in  life  and 
put  into  effect  in  some  organization,  and  this 
organization  we  perceive  to  be  the  church.  It 
is  worthy  of  remark  in  this  connection  that  one 
of  the  five  secondary  causes  given  by  Gibbon,  by 
means  of  which  the  Christian  faith  obtained  its 
remarkable  victory  over  the  established  religions 
of  the  earth  (the  chief  cause  being  the  truth  of 
the  doctrine  itself  and  the  ruling  providence  of 
its  Author),  was  "  the  union  and  discipline  of  the 
Christian  republic,  which  gradually  formed  an 
independent  and  increasing  state  in  the  heart  of 
the  Koman  Empire."  ^  And  this  union  and  dis- 
cipline we  perceive  displayed  from  the  very  first 
days  of  the  church  in  the  Book  of  the  Acts  of 
the  Apostles,  and  in  the  pastoral  epistles  of  St. 
Paul. 

(^It  was  this  strongly  uniformed  and  disciplined 
republic  or  church  that  Constantine  found  flour- 
ishing in  the  Koman  Empire  at  the  time  of  his 
accession  to  power,  a  society  acknowledging  the 
supremacy  of  the  civil  authority  in  regard  to  all 
things  that  made  for  the  outward  order  of  the 
state,  but  repudiating  it  in  regard  to  those  things 
that  concerned  conscience  and  the  inner  life.  It 
does  not  represent  the  truth  to  say,  with  St.  Au- 

'  (The  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Eoman  Empire,  Vol.  II.,  Chap. 
XV.,  p.  264.) 


148  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

gustine,  that  the  world  was  then,  as  it  had  Lc^en 
from  the  time  of  the  expulsion  of  man  from 
Paradise,  divided  into  two  great  contrasting  and 
antagonistic  cities — the  city  of  man  and  the  city 
of  God.  It  is  impossible  to  stigmatize  the  mode 
of  the  life  of  the  empire  as  wholly  evil ;  it  con- 
tained many  things  that  were  absolutely  good, 
and  many  more  that  were  relatively  so.  There 
were  some  principles  of  the  civil  law  which  were 
quite  as  humane  as  some  of  the  doctrines  of 
Christianity.  And  the  social  spirit  of  the  Ko- 
mans,  which  led  them  to  discern  a  jus  gentium^ 
and  to  extend  the  citizenship  of  Kome  to  all  the 
civilized  world,  has  never  been  surpassed  by  any 
people,  ancient  or  modern,  and  it  is  scarcely 
equaled  by  the  nations  of  the  present  age.]  The 
difficulty  lay  in  the  mixture  of  the  good  with 
the  bad,  and  the  lack  of  any  fixed  and  definite 
standard  to  determine  the  bad.  One  cannot  read 
St.  Augustine's  great  work,  however,  without 
seeing  that  there  has  always  existed  a  contrast, 
in  the  world  of  men,  between  those  who  have 
sought  for  righteousness,  and  those  who  have 
sought  for  the  gratification  of  self,  and  that 
those  whose  minds  have  been  set  upon  righteous- 
ness have  been,  for  the  most  part,  the  people,  or 
peoples,  who  have  believed  in  one,  eternal  and 
immutable  God ;  and  that  those  whose  minds 
have  been  set  on  mundane  affairs  have  been  gen- 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  149 

erally  those  who  have  believed  in  lords  many 
and  gods  many.  "  The  City  of  God  "  is  undoubt- 
edly the  first  effort  of  the  human  intellect  to  set 
forth  a  philosophy  of  history,  and  most  splen-, 
didly  was  the  task  performed.  The  Christian' 
world  has  almost  universally  taken  the  distinc- 
tion drawn  by  the  great  Bishop  of  Hippo  to  be 
true,  that  all  things  in  the  earthly  city  are  evil, 
and  that  all  things  in  the  heavenly  are  good. 
They  have  forgotten  that  the  saint  himself  has  a 
long  account  of  the  civic  virtues  of  the  ancient 
Eomans,  which  obtained  for  them  the  merits  and 
aid  of  the  one  true  God,  because  of  which  He 
enlarged  their  borders.^  And  they  have  for- 
gotten likewise  the  words  of  Christ  Himself,  that 
the  church  is  made  up,  like  the  world  itself,  of 
the  good  and  the  bad,  the  wheat  and  the  tares.^ 

That  the  church  was  far  superior  to  the  world 
when  Constantine  came  into  power  (a.d.  306)  in 
all  the  great  moral  and  spiritual  virtues,  we 
know ;  indeed,  it  is  probable  that  never  was  the 
contrast  so  marked  as  it  was  at  that  time  between 
the  "  heavenly  "  and  the  "  earthly  "  city.  It  is 
futile  to  discuss  the  exact  motive  of  Constantine 
in  making  the  religion  of  Christ  a  lawful  religion 
and  in  taking  the  church  under  his  protection. 
It  is  probable  that  he  had  been  trained  in  the 

»  (The  City  of  God,  Book  V.,  Sec.  12,  p.  198,  et  seq.) 
«(St.  Matthew  xiii.  24.) 


150  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

faith  of  his  father,  which  was  an  eclectic  system 
founded  on  a  belief  in  the  one  supreme  God,  and 
that  during  the  years  of  his  youth,  which  w^ere 
spent  as  a  hostage  in  the  court  of  Diocletian  he 
had  seen  with  aversion  the  deceits  and  machina- 
tions practiced  by  the  pagan  priesthoods  upon 
that  misguided  man.  ^  But  it  is  evident  that  his 
motives  had  less  relation  to  his  religious  convic- 
tions or  opinions,  than  to  the  fact  that  the  Chris- 
tian Church  was  a  well-organized  and  disciplined 
body,  and  would  give  him  a  firm  support  in  his 
struggle  for  the  empire.  Gibbon  speaks  of  the 
motives  of  Constantine's  conversion  as  being 
"  variously  deduced  from  benevolence,  from 
polity,  from  conviction,  or  from  remorse."  ^  And 
it  is  probable  that  all  of  these  feelings  entered 
into  the  heart  and  mind  of  the  emperor  at  some 
time  in  his  career;  but  when,  hailed  by  the 
legions  in  Britain  as  his  father's  successor,  he  ex- 
tended the  toleration  of  Constantius  to  the  Chris- 
tians, it  would  seem  that  he  was  influenced 
primarily  by  political  considerations. 

It  would  be  interesting,  here,  to  examine  the 
story  of  the  vision  of  the  cross,  as  related  by 
Eusebius  and  other  ecclesiastical  writers,  but  it 

'  (Robertson,  The  Christian  Church,  Vol.  I.,  Book  II.,  Chap, 
i.,  p.  254.) 

2  (The  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Eoman  Empire,  Vol.  II.,  Chap, 
xvi.,  p.  469.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH,  151 

has  little  relation  to  our  subject.  It  is  evident 
that  some  remarkable  omen  happened  to  Con- 
stantine  as  he  was  on  his  march  against  Maxen- 
tius  ;  whether  it  was  a  vision  or  a  hallucination, 
the  result  of  the  excitement  of  his  mind,  we  can- 
not tell,  for  some  such  thing  only  can  account 
for  the  labarum — a  banner  made  up  of  Christian 
symbols,  under  which  his  armies  marched  to  vic- 
tory, and  for  the  statue  of  himself  which  he  after- 
ward erected  in  Eome,  in  which  he  held  a  cross 
in  his  right  hand  and  under  which  there  was  an 
inscription,  attributing  his  success  to  the  power 
of  that  saving  sign.  (  Our  query  is,  what  was  the 
position  of  the  church  after  Constantine  became 
identified  with  Christianity  and  had  made  it  the 
dominant  religion  of  the  empire  ?  In  the  ancient 
world,. as  we  have  seen,  religion  and  government, 
or  church  and  state,  were  one  and  the  same  thing, 
and  so  they  remained  from  century  to  century  in 
theory  and  generally  in  fact,  until  the  time  of 
Constantine.  And  even  after  his  accession,  the 
old  civil  religion  formed  part  of  the  state.  The 
emperor  was  the  Pontifex  Maximus^  and  as  such 
he  took  part  in  heathen  ceremonies,  regarding 
them  as  attached  to  his  imperial  functions. 

But  what  was  the  status  of  the  Christian 
church  ?  The  church  was  an  organization  separate 
and  distinct  from  the  state.  Whatever  may  have 
been  the  desire  of  Constantine,  as  he  became 


152  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

more  and  more  convinced  of  the  truths  of  Chris 
tianity,  of  making  the  church  one  with  the  state, 
it  was  during  his  reign,  and  it  remained  for  j^ears 
after  his  decease,  as  Gibbon  puts  it,  a  republic 
or  state  within  the  state.  It  had  itself  become 
convinced  of  the  fact  that  it  had  a  peculiar  spir- 
itual foundation  and  a  separate  spiritual  exist- 
ence, and  it  could  not  regard  itself  as  a  state  in- 
stitution, or  as  part  of  the  state.  A  new  idea 
had  grown  up  with  it  in  history,  that  the  whole 
religious  life  of  the  community,  although  not 
withdrawn  from  the  care  and  influence  of  the 
state,  was  yet  essentially  independent  of  it.  A 
marked  dualism  between  church  and  state  was 
inevitably  seen,  and  the  state  became  limited  and 
circumscribed  in  its  sphere  of  conduct  and  action. 
It  became  now  only  a  community  of  law  and 
politics,  and  no  longer  also  of  religion  and  wor- 
ship. ^  And  this,  as  I  take  it,  is  the  most  signifi- 
cant fact  in  the  history  of  western  civilization. 

The  history  of  the  relation  between  church 
and  state  from  the  time  of  Constantine  to  Char- 
lemagne is  very  difficult  to  trace ;  and  the  rea- 
sons are  manifest.  This  period  is  the  time  of 
stress  and  storm,  of  fever  and  unrest,  of  modifi- 
cation and  adjustment,  of  the  breaking  up  of  the 
old  order  and  the  establishment  of  the  new.    For 

'  (Bluntsohli,  The  Theory  of  the  State,  Book  I.,  Chap,  iv., 
p.  41.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  153 

a  while  the  empire  seemed  to  hold  its  own  against 
the  uncouth  peoples  of  the  north,  but  gradually 
the  strength  of  the  giant  ebbed  away,  and  the 
eternal  city  became  the  prey  of  the  barbarians. 
It  was  the  withdrawal  of  the  seat  of  government 
from  Eome  to  Constantinople  that  gave  the 
bishop  of  that  city  his  great  and  wonderful  op- 
portunity, which  led  inevitably  to  the  establish- 
ment of  the  papacy.  The  head  of  the  state,  if 
he  had  remained  in  Eome,  could  easily  have  kept 
the  head  of  the  church  in  the  second  place ;  but 
no  exarch  of  the  emperor,  with  his  seat  of  gov- 
ernment at  Eavenna,  was  able  to  maintain  prior- 
ity over  the  bishop,  especially  when  he  had  be- 
come the  first  citizen  of  the  city,  and  all  the  peo- 
ples of  the  empire  still  called  themselves  "  Eo- 
mans."  And  if  no  exarch  of  the  emperor  of  the 
East  could  maintain  the  rights  of  the  empire 
over  the  bishop,  much  less  could  the  kings  of  the 
invading  barbarous  tribes.  Odoacer  and  Theo- 
doric  never  indeed  seemed  to  desire  to  subject 
the  bishop  to  their  will.  They  rarely  resided  in 
Eome,  and  Theodoric  left  it  to  be  governed  im- 
mediately by  two  consuls,  the  one  appointed  by 
the  eastern  monarch,  the  other  by  himself. 

After  the  Lombard  conquest  of  Italy,  the  po- 
litical control  of  the  eastern  emperor  over  the 
city  of  Eome  and  its  bishop  became  hardly  more 
than  nominal.     The  Exarch  of  Eavenna  was  in 


154  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

name  the  representative  of  the  emperor,  but  he 
could  do  nothing  to  help  Kome  in  its  struggle  for 
life  with  the  terrible  enemy,  and  the  conduct  of 
the  defence,  and  even  of  the  political  administra- 
tion of  the  city,  soon  passed  into  the  hands  of  the 
bishop.  In  this  way  there  was  gradually  added 
to  the  general  ecclesiastical  power  which  was  ac- 
cruing to  him,  the  internal  independent  political 
government  of  a  state.  This  incipient  temporal 
power  was  gradually  extended  by  Gregory  I. 
(a.  d.  590)  and  made  firm  and  secure.  Gregory 
the  Great  was  born  of  a  family  of  senatorial 
rank  and  had  attained,  in  his  early  manhood,  to 
the  office  of  praetor  of  Eome.  At  thirty-five  he 
abandoned  his  worldly  pursuits  and  entered  upon 
a  monastic  life.  At  the  death  of  Pope  Pelagius 
II.  he  was  chosen  by  the  senate,  the  clergy  and 
the  people,  to  fill  the  vacant  chair.  It  would  be 
difficult  to  narrate  all  the  affairs  which  occupied 
the  time  and  attention  of  this  splendid  pope.  It 
is  sufficient  to  say  that  he  set  apart  and  com- 
missioned civil  and  military,  as  well  as  ecclesias- 
tical offices  ;  that  he  made  peace  independentl}^ 
of  the  empire,  and  that  he  generally  took  charge 
of  all  the  affairs,  little  and  big,  of  the  Eoman 
people.  Another  event,  the  sack  of  Eome  by 
Alaric,  had  aided  the  growth  of  the  power  of 
its  bishop.  The  aristocratic  society  of  the  city, 
with  the  usual  conservatism  of  an  aristocracy, 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  155 

has  remained  pagan.  Alaric  largely  spared  the 
Christians,  and  scattered  and  destroyed  the  pagan 
society,  leaving  the  bishop  and  his  clergy  with- 
out social,  as  they  had  been  without  official,  ri- 
vals. And  still  another  thing  contributed  to  this 
same  end  :  the  orthodox  character  of  the  bishops 
of  Eome,  and  the  appeals  which  the  catholic 
bishops  made  to  them  in  their  controversy  with 
the  Arian  heretics.  The  Council  of  Sardica  di- 
rectly authorized  this  thing,  and  decreed  a  lim- 
ited right  of  appeal  to  Julius,  at  that  time  bishop 
of  Kome.^ 

But  the  most  important  cause  for  the  advance- 
ment of  the  papacy  was  the  dissolution  of  the 
western  empire  itself,  and  the  establishment  of 
the  dominion  of  the  Franks.  This  alliance,  for 
though  there  was  no  open  agreement,  it  was  in 
truth  a  combination  and  alliance  that  was  en- 
tered into  between  the  Frankish  rulers  and  the 
popes  of  Eome,  was  the  most  important  ever 
made  in  the  history  of  the  world.  By  it  the 
great  and  holy  see  of  Rome  became  emancipated 
from  all  allegiance  to  the  emperors  of  the  East 
and  entered  on  the  splendid  role  it  afterward 
played  so  fearlessly — the  role  of  arbiter  of  kings 
and  supreme  ruler  over  the  peoples  of  the  western 
world.     And  by  it,  it  received  immediately  the 

*  (Can.  3,  Hefele's  Hist.  Councils  of  the  Church,  Vol.  II.,  p. 
112.) 


156  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

territory  that  had  belonged  to  the  exarchate  of 
northern  Italy,  which  gradually  grew  into  the 
States  of  the  Church,  and  which,  making  the 
pope  a  temporal,  as  well  as  a  spiritual  monarch, 
enabled  him  the  easier  to  enter  into  the  political 
iife  of  Europe.  What  the  Frankish  rulers  re- 
ceived was  very  little  in  fact,  though  it  appeared 
very  much  ;  they  were  granted,  first,  the  title  of 
Patrician  of  Rome,  and  then,  in  the  person  of 
Charlemagne,  they  were  raised  to  the  exalted 
rank  of  Augustus  and  Emperor  of  the  Western 
Roman  Empire. 

The  coronation  of  Charles  the  Great  is  the 
central  point  of  the  middle  ages,  and  a  factor  in 
the  development  of  European  civilization  which 
has  not  yet  spent  its  force.  It  is  one  of  the  few 
great  events  of  history,  that  is,  one  that  has  per- 
manently changed  the  mode  and  form  of  the  de- 
velopment of  mankind.^  In  the  day  when  Charles 
was  crowned,  as  indeed  throughout  all  the  mid- 
dle ages  of  the  history  of  Europe,  two  great  an- 
tagonistic forces  were  striving  for  the  mastery  in 
the  world  of  politics,  the  force  that  makes  for 
separation  and  the  force  that  makes  for  unity. 
The  force  that  made  for  separation  found  its  me- 
diate outcome  in  feudalism,  the  force  that  made 
for  unity  found  its  immediate  exposition  in  the 
kingdom  of  Charles.  It  is  true  that  feudalism 
'  (Biyce,  The  Holy  Roman  Empire,  Chap,  v.,  p.  50.) 


THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH.  157 

arose  eventually  out  of  the  fragments  of  the 
Carlovingian  Empire,  but  behind  the  sovereign 
feudatories  and  the  free  cities  of  western  Europe 
there  loomed  up  ever  the  fact  that  they  all  had 
their  root  in  an  empire  that  had  been  almost  uni- 
versal, and  which  in  its  turn  found  its  historical 
basis  in  the  old  dominion  of  Kome.  Feudalism 
had  many  abuses,  and  we  are  well  rid  of  it,  but 
we  cannot  but  perceive  when  we  study  the  con- 
ditions of  life  in  mediaeval  days  that  it  was  a 
necessity  in  the  times  of  ignorance  and  disorder 
that  came  upon  Christendom  after  the  death  of 
Charles,  for  it  was  the  system  by  which  the  in- 
dividualism of  the  barbaric  princes  and  their 
fierce  descendants  was  curbed  and  controlled, 
and  the  probable  outcome  of  the  force  that  made 
for  separation  prevented.  It  was  feudalism  that 
stood  in  the  way  of  absolute  anarchy.  And  this 
institution,  the  medium  through  which  the  Chris- 
tian nations  have  come  from  savagery  to  civiliza- 
tion, would  not  have  been  possible  but  for  the 
empire  of  Charles;  although,  be  it  observed, 
Charles  did  not  have  it  in  mind.  It  was  the 
institution  of  feudalism  also  that  the  papacy 
made  use  of,  when,  after  the  decline  of  the  em- 
pire of  the  Franks,  it  came  forward  to  offer  to 
the  world  another  basis  of  unity,  the  church  of 
God. 

But  out  of  this  alliance  between  the  Franks 


158  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

and  the  church  two  dangers  immediately  arose, 
a  danger  to  the  church  and  a  danger  to  the  state. 
The  danger  was  similar  to  both,  and  was  either 
that  the  state  should  absorb  the  church,  or  the 
church  the  state.  And  first  the  danger  came  to 
the  church.  At  several  times  in  the  history  of 
the  East  the  empire  threatened  to  make  the 
church  a  part  of  itself,  like  as  was  the  old  civic 
religion  of  Eome.  Indeed  it  did  so  under  some 
of  the  early  emperors ;  even  as  it  has  so  done  un- 
der the  later  Tzars.  The  Carlovingian  state 
threatened  to  do  the  same  thing ;  and  we  must 
believe  that  it  was  only  the  strongly  organized 
institution  of  the  Holy  Eoman  Church,  governed 
by  one  single  and  supreme  head,  which  rescued 
Christendom  from  this  fate.  The  extent  of  the 
effort  of  Charles  the  Great  to  absorb  the  church 
in  his  state  is  seen  in  his  Capitularies,  and  the 
rank  and  authority  he  bestowed  upon  the  bishops 
and  other  ecclesiastics  in  his  wide  domain.  It  is 
seen  also  in  the  fact  that  he  himself  summoned 
synods  and  revised  the  canons  proposed  by  them, 
and  gave  them  their  validity.  JThe  Capitularies 
of  Charles  are  both'  intricate  and  numerous,  and 
they  touch  upon  every  conceivable  subject,  both 
in  the  religious  and  in  the  civil  life  of  the  many 
peoples  under  his  sway.  In  them  matters  of 
church  and  state  are  mixed  up  inextricably. 
They  have  all   been    examined    and   classified, 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  159 

though  not,  as  I  understand,  with  the  care  that 
they  deserve.  They  contain  according  to  the 
analytical  table  prepared  by  Guizot,^  eleven  hun- 
dred and  fifty  articles,  of  which  eighty  refer  to 
moral  legislation,  two  hundred  and  seventy-three 
to  politics,  one  hundred  and  thirty  to  penal,  one 
hundred  and  ten  to  civil,  eighty-five  to  religious, 
three  hundred  and  nine  to  canonical,  seventy- 
three  to  domestic  and  twelve  to  occasional  sub- 
jects, a  heterogeneous  mass  of  matter  which 
would  now  by  common  consent  be  divided  be- 
tween church  and  state  without  question  or  de- 
bate. That  the  church  was  not  absorbed  into 
the  state  under  the  rule  of  the  Carlovingians 
arose  also  out  of  the  fact  that  the  descendants  of 
Charles  had  not  the  strength  of  mind  and  body 
that  distinguished  that  great  monarch,  and  the 
division  that  Lewis  the  Pious,  the  son  and  heir 
of  Charles,  made  of  the  empire  among  his  sons. 
If  the  empire  had  remained  united  in  one  strong- 
hand,  it  might  have  been  able  to  make  the  church 
a  part  of  itself.  And  if  not,  it  would  certainly 
have  had  the  power  to  resist  the  danger  which 
afterward  threatened  it  of  being  engulfed  by  the 
church. 

The  effort  of  the  church  to  absorb  the  state  is 
the  most  remarkable  phenomenon  in  the  history 

*  (History  of  Civilization  in  France,  Vol.  III.,  Twenty-first 
Lecture. ) 


160  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  Europe.  It  seems  incredible  that  the  institu- 
tion of  the  gentle  and  mild-mannered  Jesus,  in  a 
few  hundred  years,  should  become  not  only  the 
dominant  but  the  dominating  power  of  the 
world.  Why  was  it  ?  Some  of  the  causes  for 
the  rise  of  the  papacy  I  have  briefly  touched 
upon ;  but  there  were  many  others,  and  the  chief 
among  them  was  the  force  of  an  idea.  The  Ro- 
man dominion  gave  the  world  a  common  lan- 
guage and  a  common  law,  and  united  the  nations 
by  these  strong  ties  together  in  an  empire  of  in- 
ternal peace  that  was  most  desired  and  desirable. 
When  the  old  empire  of  Rome  was  divided  and 
broken ;  and  again,  when  the  new  empire  of  the 
Carlo vingians  declined  and  fell  away,  men  who 
had  learned  to  love  a  unity  of  life  and  who  be- 
lieved that  disunion  meant  a  return  to  barbarism, 
turned  their  eyes  ever  more  and  more  to  the 
great  successor  of  the  emperors  at  Rome,  the 
pope.  The  pope,  again,  placed  before  them  an 
institution  in  which  they  could  find  as  firm  a 
basis  of  unity  as  the  empire  had  offered,  the  Ro- 
man or  catholic  church.  Indeed,  this  unity 
which  the  church  represented  was  a  higher  and 
nobler  thing  than  that  of  the  empire,  for  it  was 
based  upon  humanity  and  not  on  law ;  on  love, 
and  not  on  force.  No  wonder,  then,  that  the 
church  was  so  passionately  revered.  The  power 
of  ideas  in  the  middle   ages  was  enormous  in 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  161 

every  way  and  can  scarcely  be  realized  by  us  to- 
day. We  can  see  this  especially  in  the  Crusades. 
J^ot  the  gift  of  Charlemagne,  not  the  position  of 
the  first  see  in  Christendom,  not  the  fact,  true  or 
supposed,  that  the  pope's  chair  was  St.  Peter's, 
not  all  the  fortuitous  circumstances  which  fa- 
vored the  rule  of  the  bishop  of  Eome,  yes,  not 
even  the  false  and  favorable  decretals,  can  ac- 
count for  the  tremendous  growth  and  strength  of 
the  papacy.  They  arose  out  of  the  idea  that  the 
Koman  empire  which  had  gathered  all  the  known 
peoples  of  the  earth  within  its  folds,  was  eternal, 
and  that  the  quality  of  eternity  had  passed  by 
right  divine  to  the  Church  of  Christ,  and  with  it 
the  rule  of  the  world.  It  is  true  that  this  idea 
was  somewhat  long  in  coming  to  maturity.  We 
find  but  few  traces  of  it  until  after  the  Carlovin- 
gian  rulers  had  passed  away ;  yet  these  were  the 
periods  of  uncertainty  and  dissension  ;  men  were 
not  quite  sure  which  was  the  rightful  successor 
to  the  old  Koman  power,  the  Kaiser  or  the  Pope, 
(it  is  from  the  coronation  of  Otto  the  Great 
(a.  d.  962)  that  a  new  era  begins,  a  new  phase 
for  the  Holy  Koman  Empire  and  for  the  Holy 
Koman  Church.  Now  it  is  that  the  ideas  that 
had  been  floating  in  men's  minds  took  shape,  and 
we  see  the  relations  of  the  emperor  and  the  pope 
presented  under  the  figure  of  the  body  and  the 
soul.     "  The  Pope,  as  God's  vicar  in  matters  spir- 


162  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

itual,  is  to  lead  men  to  eternal  life ;  the  Emperor, 
as  vicar  in  matters  temporal,  must  so  control 
them  in  their  dealings  with  one  another  that 
they  may  be  able  to  pursue  undisturbed  the  spir- 
itual life,  and  thereby  attain  the  same  supreme 
and  common  end  of  everlasting  happiness."  ^  At 
the  outset  the  church  and  the  empire  worked  to- 
gether harmoniously  -enough,  but  gradually  the 
church  asserted  that  as  the  soul's  interests  are 
superior  to  those  of  the  body,  so  the  interests  of 
the  pope,  and  consequently  his  poAver,  are  su- 
perior to  those  of  the  emperor,  and  the  emperor 
ceased  to  be  the  vicar  of  God  in  things  temporal 
and  became  the  vicar  of  the  pope.  And  so  it 
came  about  naturally  that  the  great  fathers  of 
the  church  of  the  middle  ages  declared  that  the 
pope  was  the  sole  representative  of  God  on  the 
earth,  and  they  came  to  the  conclusion  that 
church  and  state  were  as  two  swords  which  God 
had  given  to  Christendom  for  its  protection,  that 
both  of  them,  however,  were  given  by  Him  to  the 
pope,  and  the  temporal  sword  was  by  him  handed 
to  the  rulers  of  the  states. 

In  view  of  such  notions  it  is  easy  to  understand 
how  the  papal  pretensions  grew.  We  perceive 
that  the  claim  of  Gregory  YII.  (a.  d.  1073)  to  an 
absolute  supremacy  over  the  whole  Christian  and 
pagan  world  was   a  logical  necessity.     Such  a 

>  (Bryce,  The  Holy  Roman  Empire,  Chap,  vii.,  p.  105.) 


THE  STATE  AND    THE  CHURCH.  163 

claim  was  the  inevitable  outcome  of  such  ideas. 
Look  one  moment  at  the  acts  of  this  imperious 
man.  The  kings  of  the  growing  Spanish  states 
are  reminded  that  territory  conquered  from  the 
infidel  belongs  of  right  to  the  pope  as  vassal  ter- 
ritory. The  king  of  Munster  in  Ireland  is  in- 
formed that  all  sovereigns  are  subjects  of  St. 
Peter,  and  that  all  the  world  owes  obedience  to 
him  and  to  his  successor.  The  fealty  of  England 
is  demanded  from  William  the  Conqueror.  Im- 
perious letters  are  written  to  the  kings  of  France. 
Political  affairs  are  even  noticed  in  Russia.  And 
the  triumph  of  Hildebrand  over  the  Emperor 
Henry  lY.,  at  Canosa,  is  the  most  significant  as 
well  as  the  most  dramatic  incident  in  the  history 
of  the  papacy.  It  is  true  that  many  of  these 
claims  and  most  of  this  conduct  are  founded  upon 
the  so-called  donation  of  Constantine  of  the  west 
to  Bishop  Sylvester,  which  the  mediaeval  world 
generally  believed ;  but  the  donation,  or  the  be- 
lief in  it,  would  have  been  of  no  avail  except  for 
the  belief  in  the  idea  that  has  been  previously  set 
forth  that  a  world-wide  empire  was  a  most  de- 
sirable thing,  and  that  the  pope  was  logically  its 
ruler,  both  as  inheritor  of  the  Roman  power  and 
as  chief  bishop  in  the  catholic  church.  The 
Holy  Roman  Empire  of  the  German  People, 
especially  after  the  rise  of  the  kingdoms  of  Spain, 
France    and   England,   was   perceived   to   be   a 


164  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

limited  and  contracted  thing,  and  the  emperor 
"  a  king  of  shreds  and  patches  "  rather  than  a 
strong  and  po^verful  ruler.  When  John,  King  of 
England,  knelt  before  the  Koman  legate  Pandulf, 
and  surrendered  his  kingdom  to  the  Koman  See, 
taking  it  back  as  a  tributary  vassal,  it  was  be- 
lieved in  after  times  that  all  England  thrilled  at 
the  news  with  a  sense  of  national  shame  and 
humiliation.  But  "  we  see,'-  says  Green  ^  "  little 
trace  of  such  a  feeling  in  the  contemporary  ac- 
counts of  the  time.  All  seem  rather  to  have  re- 
garded it  as  a  complete  settlement  of  the  diffi- 
culties in  which  the  king  and  the  kingdom  were 
involved."  ) 

It  is  fdreign  to  our  study  to  enter  upon  the 
history  of  the  struggle  between  the  church  and 
the  empire  and  the  kingdoms  of  Christendom. 
Everywhere  it  went  on,  and  for  a  while,  it  looked 
as  if  the  civil  authority  would  be  utterly  sub- 
merged. The  outcome  can  best  be  seen  as  we 
study  the  range  of  the  theory  so  strenuously 
maintained  by  Pope  Innocent  III.,  called  the 
Theory  of  the  Translation  of  the  Empire.  In- 
nocent alleged  that  the  empire  was  taken  from 
the  Greeks  and  given  to  the  Germans  in  the  per- 
son of  Charles  by  Pope  Leo  III.  as  God's  repre- 
sentative, and  that  what  Leo  gave  could  by  his 

1  (Hist,  of  the  English  People,  Vol.  I.,  Book  III.,  Chap,  i., 
p.  236.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  165 

successor  be  taken  away  and  bestowed  upon  an- 
other. It  is  probable  that  the  consciousness  of 
nationality,  which  gradually  grew  into  life  after 
the  decline  of  feudalism,  and  the  patriotic  feel- 
ings that  flowed  from  it,  would  have  been  strong 
enough  to  have  modified,  if  not  to  have  destroyed 
the  claim  of  the  papal  church  to  universal 
dominion,  even  if  no  ecclesiastical  scandals  had 
arisen,  and  no  fiery  reformers  had  appeared  to 
question  the  rule  of  the  popes.  As  it  was,  this 
consciousness  was  undoubtedly  the  greatest  fac- 
tor in  the  period  of  the  reformation,  and  did 
most  to  make  it  effective.  The  idea  of  the  neces- 
sary unity  of  the  western  world  never  quite  took 
root  in  the  British  Isles;  they  were  the  last 
countries  incorporated  in,  and  the  first  released 
from,  the  Eoman  Empire ;  and  even  in  those 
countries  where  it  had  taken  root,  it  gradually 
faded  away,  as  distinct  languages  were  formed 
and  customary  laws  hardened  into  legal  systems ; 
and  soon  there  arose  the  conviction  that  each 
people  was  sufficient  unto  itself,  and  that  it  ought 
to  have,  and  ought  to  govern,  its  own  distinctive 
church.  This  new  idea  did  not  by  any  means 
become  universal  even  after  the  Keformation  had 
become  an  accomplished  fact,  that  is,  after  the 
Treaty  of  Westphalia  had  been  signed  (a.  d. 
1648),  because  many  nations  remained  Eoman  in 
form,   and    in    many  that   became   Protestant, 


166  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

masses  of  the  people  continued  to  be  attached  to 
the  old  Koman  church  and  ideas. 

The  new  way  of  looking  at  things  is  best  seen 
in  England,  where  the  church  became  distinctively 
one  with  the  nation  (a.  d.  1529)  and  conterminous 
with  it,  governed  for  the  most  part  by  its  parlia- 
ment and  subject  to  the  same  head  as  the  state. 
The  theory  that  the  church  and  state  are  one  and 
the  same  society  contemplated  from  two  different 
aspects,  and  that  the  Christian  state  has  a  perfect 
right  to  legislate  for  the  church,  is  most  fully  set 
forth  by  Kichard  Hooker  in  his  celebrated 
treatise  on  the  Laws  of  Ecclesiastical  Polity.^ 
Hooker,  it  is  to  be  remarked,  is  not  so  extreme  in 
his  views  of  the  duty  of  the  state  to  religion  and 
the  church  as  was  the  late  Mr.  Gladstone. 
Hooker  regarded  the  state  and  the  church  as 
naturally  existing  historical  facts  in  the  order  of 
Christendom,  of  which  one  is  providentially  the 
complement  of  the  other,  while  Mr.  Gladstone 
sought  to  prove  that  the  state  ought  to  establish 
and  endow  a  religion,  and  more  particularly  that 
England  ought  to  maintain  the  establishment  of 
Christianity  and  the  endowment  of  the  English 
Church.^    But  we  need  not  stop  to  study  Mr. 

^Book  VIII.,  Chap.  i.  2,  and  Chap.  vi.  8,  Keble's  Ed.) 

'  (The  State  in  its  Relations  with  the  Church,  Vol.  I.,  Chap. 

ii.,  Part  I.,  87  and  97-99.     And  see  also  Vol.  II.,  Chap.  \a., 

Sec.  1.) 


THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH.  167 

Gladstone's  theories.  They  have  been  critically 
examined,  and  as  it  seems  to  me,  demolished  by 
Lord  Macaulay  in  his  essay  on  "Gladstone  on 
Church  and  State." ' 

We  find  Hooker's  ideas  more  or  less  prevalent 
in  other  countries  in  his  age ;  in  Protestant  Ger- 
many, Denmark  and  Sweden,  in  the  united  Prov- 
inces of  IS'etherlands,  and  in  the  republic  of  Ge- 
neva. Church  and  state  became  for  the  most 
part  one  and  the  same  society,  which  society  is 
termed  a  commonwealth  as  it  lives  under  the 
form  of  secular  law  and  government ;  a  church  as 
it  has  the  spiritual  law  of  Jesus  Christ.  Eeli- 
gion  was,  and  is,  still  taught  in  the  schools,  and 
provision  was,  and  is  still,  made  by  the  different 
civil  governments  for  the  support  of  the  ministers 
of  the  church.  Spain,  we  know,  has  remained 
under  the  dominion  of  the  pope,  though  ever  in 
a  less  and  less  degree,  until  it  can  now  be  said 
that  his  authority  is  recognized  only  in  reli- 
gious matters.  The  Spanish- American  republics, 
though  Koman  Catholic  in  form,  are  decidedly 
hostile  to  the  claims  of  the  papacy.  France  has 
alternated  with  her  rulers;  sometimes  she  has 
submitted  to  the  pope,  sometimes  she  has  set  his 
authority  aside,  and  sometimes  she  has  made 
agreements,  concordats,  limiting  it  in  some  cases, 
and  agreeing  to  acknowledge  it  in  others ;  but 

*  (Macaulay 's  Essays,  Vol.  II.,  p.  107,  Trevelyan's  Ed.) 


168  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

during  all  the  time  the  idea  of  a  Gallican  church 
for  the  Gallic  people  has  grown.  Some  day, 
perhaps,  we  shall  see  it  un  fait  accompli^  or  it 
may  be  we  shall  see  adopted  in  France  by  the 
consent  of  all,  the  American  idea  of  the  entire 
separation  of  church  and  state,  that  is,  the 
abandonment  by  the  state  of  all  interference 
with  religion,  and  the  relinquishment  by  the 
church  of  all  subsidies  to  her  ministers  and  teach- 
ers. It  seems  to  me  that  this  will  be  the  only 
solution  of  the  vexatious  war  that  has  been  car- 
ried on  between  the  clericals  and  the  anti-cleri- 
cals since  the  overthrow  of  the  Second  Empire. 

And  this  can  be  the  only  solution  of  the  many 
difficulties  that  have  sprung  up  in  church  and 
state  in  England.  The  various  controversies 
that  have  lately  arisen  seem  difficult  to  under- 
stand, and  they  are  difficult  to  understand  in  de- 
tail, but  when  we  remember  that  Parliament, 
which  has  full  power  of  legislating  for  the  church, 
is  to-day  made  up  not  of  churchmen  nor  yet  nec- 
essarily of  Christians,  but  of  Anglicans,  JSTon-con- 
formists,  Koman  Catholics,  Jews  and  infidels,  we 
perceive  the  crux  of  the  whole  matter.  In  Kef- 
ormation  times  it  was  far  different.  Then  Par- 
liament was  an  assembly  of  churchmen  whose 
title  to  speak  in  church  matters  was  the  same  as 
a  lay  House  of  Convocation ;  but  what  church- 
man will  listen  to  the  voice  of  Parliament  as  at 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  1G9 

present  constituted,  or  give  adherence  to  the  de- 
cisions of  the  civil  courts  erected  by  it,  the  judges 
of  which  may  be  nominated  by  men  who  are  in- 
imical to  the  church,  or  it  may  be  to  religion  it- 
self ?  On  the  other  hand,  the  decisions  that  have 
been  rendered  by  the  Archbishops  of  Canterbury 
and  their  Assessors  are  not  decisions  in  the  sense 
of  judgments  that  must  be  followed,  rather  are 
they  counsels  of  advice.  How  are  these  contro- 
versies, then,  to  be  decided  ?  Some  recommend 
the  disestablishment  and  the  disendowment  of 
the  church,  some  the  creation  of  new  state  courts 
with  new  and  extraordinary  powers,  some  again 
the  endowment  of  ecclesiastical  courts  with  the 
whole  power  of  the  state.  Without  making  any 
attempt  to  discuss  the  ways  suggested  of  solving 
the  question,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  drift  is  in- 
evitably toward  disestablishment,  and  to  this 
end  there  works  not  only  the  change  that  we  see 
in  the  status  of  Parliament  and  therefore  of  its 
relation  to  the  church,  but  the  change  that  has 
taken  place  in  regard  to  the  royal  supremacy. 
In  theory  still  the  sovereign,  as  God's  vice-regent 
on  earth,  is  the  supreme  governor  of  the  church, 
but  in  fact  and  in  practice  the  ecclesiastical,  like 
the  other  prerogatives  of  the  crown,  are  no 
longer  exercised  by  the  Queen  personally,  but  by 
her  ministers,  responsible  to  Parliament  itself. 
It  is  the  prime  minister   who    nominates    the 


170  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

bishops  and  other  dignitaries  of  the  church.  It 
is  the  minister  who  nominates  the  ecclesiastical 
judges. 

We  must  understand  that  it  was  not  until  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States 
with  its  first  ten  amendments  (a.  d.  1Y89)  that 
the  idea  came  to  maturity  that  a  state  can  foster 
and  encourage  religion,  and  not  establish  any 
church  or  make  provision  for  religious  instruction 
and  worship.  The  Puritans,  when  they  founded 
their  commonwealth  in  Massachusetts,  estab- 
lished a  church  or  rather  many  affiliated  churches. 
Virginia  established  the  established  Church  of 
England  in  her  colony,  and  the  Dutch  provided 
for  public  worship  after  the  manner  of  the  re- 
formed Dutch  Church  of  Holland  in  their  settle- 
ment. But  the  Dutch  had  learned  the  great 
lesson  of  religious  toleration,  and  had  learned 
that  lesson  well.  It  is  noteworthy  that  the  first 
settlers  of  New  Amsterdam  provided  for  a 
schoolmaster  and  for  a  visitor  of  the  sick  before 
they  did  for  a  minister.  While  the  Puritans 
were  persecuting  the  Quakers,  and  the  Quakers 
were  ordering  that  no  "Jew,  Turk,  infidel  or 
heretic  "  should  live  within  their  colony,  New 
Amsterdam  gave  a  home  to  everything  that  was 
human.  There  men  of  all  sorts  and  conditions 
met  together ;  even  Komanists  and  Protestants 
fraternized,  and  did  kindly  acts,  the  one  for  the 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH  171 

other.  There,  too,  the  national  differences  were 
minimized;  Dutch,  French  and  English,  were 
spoken  each  by  so  many  people  that  public  docu- 
ments had  to  be  written  in  all  three  tongues.  ^  I 
do  not  think  that  there  is  any  doubt  that  it  was 
religious  toleration,  the  conception  of  William 
the  Silent,  the  great  product  of  the  civilization 
of  the  Dutch,  that  was  the  seed-idea  out  of  which 
grew  the  American  principle  of  an  entirely  dis- 
tinct separation  between  church  and  state. 
When  Peter  Stuyvesant  was  forced  to  surrender 
his  charge  to  Colonel  Nichols,  one  of  his  chief 
stipulations  was  that  the  Dutch  should  continue 
to  enjoy  liberty  of  conscience  in  divine  worship 
and  church  discipline.  Although  the  Church  of 
England  was  afterward  established  in  New  York 
by  a  trick  of  Governor  Fletcher,  religious  liberty 
was  the  keynote  and  idea  of  this  most  cosmo- 
politan of  all  the  colonies  that  engaged  in  the 
great  struggle  for  civil  liberty  in  1YT6.  Tolera- 
tion in  religion,  which  President  Eliot  claims  to 
be  the  best  fruit  of  the  last  four  centuries  of  civ- 
ilization, ^  is  the  great  gift  of  the  Dutch  to  the 
world.  Separation  of  church  and  state,  with 
mutual  consideration  and  regard,  as  of  two 
friendly  pillars  of  society,  is  the  great  gift  of  the 

'  (McConnell,  Hist,  of  the  Am.  Episcopal  Church,  Chap,  v., 
p.  62.) 
^(Am.  Contributions  to  Civilization,  p.  385.) 


172  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

American  people.  This  gift  is  set  forth  in  the 
first  amendment  of  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  and  reads  as  follows :  "  Congress 
shall  make  no  law  respecting  an  establishment 
of  religion  or  prohibiting  the  free  exercise 
thereof." 

And  yet  we  must  not  understand  by  these 
words  that  the  framers  of  this  amendment  in- 
tended and  that  the  people  of  the  United  States 
understood  that  all  religions  are  to  be  tolerated. 
Congress  has  taken  action  in  stamping  out  Mor- 
monism  so  far  as  it  conflicts  with  the  morals  of 
Christianity  as  embodied  in  the  municipal  law  of 
W .  the  land,  and  the  Chinese  are  excluded  from  citi- 
- — zenship  because  of  their  crass  paganism.  We  are 
to  understand  by  the  term  religion  the  religions 
of  the  different  Christian  churches.  The  state 
fosters  Christianity  because  the  citizens  of  the 
state  are  for  the  most  part  Christian  in  char- 
acter. At  the  meetings  of  Congress  and  of  other 
legislatures,  a  clergyman  usually  offers  a  prayer 
in  Christ's  name  to  Almighty  God.^  Chaplains 
are  employed  for  the  army  and  navy  out  of  a 
state  polity  that  is  Christian  in  character.  The 
Lord's  day,  as  one  of  the  institutions  of  Chris- 
tianity, is  protected  by  law  from  desecration  in 
order  to  secure  to  the  community  the  privilege 
of  undisturbed  worship,  as  well  as  to  all  who 
'  (Except  of  course  where  a  Jew  is  requested  to  officiate.) 


THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH.  173 

labor  a  day  of  rest  and  of  cessation  from  toil. 
The  different  states  have  laws  by  which  the  or- 
ganizations of  various  denominations  and  churches 
of  Christendom  are  encouraged  and  facilitated. 
In  nearly  all  the  states  the  property  of  churches 
is  exempt  from  taxation,  and  because  the  prop- 
erty of  the  churches  is  exempt,  so  is  that  of  the 
Jewish  synagogues.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
churches  support  the  state  by  precept  and  ex- 
ample; they  have  learned  and  they  teach  their 
members  the  great  maxim  of  the  founder  of 
Christianity,  to  render  unto  Caesar  the  things 
that  are  Csesar's,  while  giving  to  God  the  things 
that  are  God's.  They  see  that  society  has  a  ;' 
double  organization,  both  conducive  to  the  wel- 1 
fare  of  men :  the  state,  which  provides  for  the  ! 
external  order  of  things  by  law  and  politics ;  the 
church,  which  cares  for  the  internal  motives  of 
men  and  their  worship  of  Almighty  God.  And  ; 
they  believe  that  these  two  must  mutually  sus- 
tain and  support  the  one  the  other  in  a  common 
polity  which,  as  it  approaches  more  and  more  the 
doctrine  and  the  precepts  of  Christ,  realizes  more 
and  more  on  earth  the  will  of  God  in  Heaven. 

Yet  we  must  understand  that  the  American 
principle  of  the  entire  separation  of  church  and 
state  is  not  a  new  thing  in  history.  It  is  the 
principle  that  was  in  operation  during  the  apos- 
tolic and  sub-apostolic  times,  and  the  one  there- 


174  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH 

fore  which  takes  us  back  to  the  teachings  of 
Christ ;  and  yet  there  is  a  difference  to  be  noted. 
Until  the  time  of  Constantine  and  at  certain 
periods  afterward  the  state  was  inimical  toward 
the  church  and  often  its  dreadful  persecutor. 
The  American  principle  is  a  free  state  and  a  free 
church  existing  side  by  side  in  peace  and  amity, 
each  one  upholding  the  power  and  dignity  of  the 
other,  yet  neither  asking  for  favors  nor  for  pe- 
cuniary support,  both  working  in  their  respective 
spheres  for  the  welfare  and  happiness  of  men. 


LECTUEE  Y. 

THE  LAW   OF  THE  STATE. 

It  is  scarcely  possible  to  give  an  exact  and 
comprehensive  definition  of  the  term  "  law  "  as 
the  word  is  used  in  our  English  tongue,  because 
many  English  and  American  jurists  have  con- 
founded the  Latin  term  lex  with^^^.  Thus  Sidg- 
wick  says,  "  We  must  define  Laws  to  be  Rules  of 
Conduct,  which  we  are  morally  bound  to  obey, 
not  solely  on  account  of  their  intrinsic  rightness 
but  on  account  of  the  Rightful  Authority  from 
which  they  are  derived."  ^  And  Willoughby  says, 
"  The  State  has  been  defined  as  a  society  viewed 
from  its  organized  side,  that  is,  considered  in  its 
aspect  as  a  political  organization  for  the  attain- 
ment of  an  orderly  existence  and  a  possible  de- 
velopment. In  the  effectuation  of  these  pur- 
poses its  activities  are  largely  manifested  in  the 
utterance  and  enforcement  of  commands  ad- 
dressed to  its  citizens.  Such  commands  we  des- 
ignate laws,  and  in  the  aggregate  they  constitute 
what  is  known  as  ^  the  law  of  the  land.' "  ^ 

'  (Methods  of  Ethics,  Book  III.,  Chap,  vi.,  p.  266.) 
2  (The  Nature  of  the  State,  Chap,  vii.,  p.  142. ) 
175 


176  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

These  definitions  follow,  as  we  know,  more  or 
less  blindly,  the  theory  of  Austin,  the  father  of 
modern  English  jurisprudence,  which  makes  all 
law  to  be  nothing  else  than  the  aggregation  of 
rules  set  by  men  as  politically  superior  or  sov- 
ereign to  men  as  politically  subject.  Austin's 
theory,  as  Mr.  Smith  has  conclusively  shown, 
arose  primarily  from  a  confusion  by  him  of  the 
Latin  word  or  term  ^'^5  with  that  of  lex.  He  de- 
fined law  as  the  equivalent  of  lex  but  used  it 
habitually  as  including  jtis}  "The  theory  of 
Austin  is  in  fact  wholly  based  upon  the  ambi- 
guity of  the  term  law  ;  which  is  defined  by  him 
as  though  equivalent  to  the  Latin  lex,  but  habit- 
ually used  as  though  including  the  whole  law,  or 
jus.  Thus, — taking  for  illustration  the  famous 
position  of  Austin,  that  judicial  decisions  are  in 
fact  commands  or  expressions  of  the  will  of  the 
State,  and  therefore  in  no  wise  different  in  essen- 
tial nature  from  laws  or  statutes — it  is  obvious 
that  the  conclusion  is  deduced  by  an  apparent 
syllogism  of  which  the  major  premise  is  the 
proposition  that  all  law  is  an  expression  of  the 
will  of  the  State  or  government,  and  the  minor, 
that  judicial  decisions  constitute  part  of  the  law  / 
from  which — assuming  that  the  term  law  be  used 
in  the  same  sense  in  both  propositions — the  con- 

^  (I  give  Mr,  Smith's  analysis  and  criticism  of  the  term  law 
as  used  by  Austin  verbatim. ) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  177 

elusion  must  necessarily  follow.  But,  in  fact,  in 
the  major  premise  it  is  used  in  the  sense  of  lex^ 
and  in  the  minor  in  that  of  jus. 

"The  same  fallacy  is  also  illustrated  by  the 
equally  famous  position  of  the  same  writer,  that 
custom  does  not  constitute  part  of  the  law — the 
argument  being  as  follows :  (1)  As  before  :  All 
law  (lex)  is  an  expression  of  the  will  of  the  State. 
(2)  Custom  is  not  an  expression  of  the  will  of 
the  State.  M^go,  (3)  Custom  is  not  part  of  the 
law  (jus).^^  ^  "We  must  understand  that  it  is  not 
always  easy  to  distinguish  the  term  jus  from 
that  of  lex  in  the  Eoman  law,  for  the  different 
lawyers  who  expanded  and  expounded  the  law 
of  Eome  have  not  always  been  careful  to  keep 
the  two  words  distinct ;  but  this  can  be  said,  that 
though  ^i^^  in  its  general  significance  means  law, 
and  in  this  sense  includes  all  law,  whether  made 
by  statute  or  otherwise,  in  a  narrower  sense  it  is 
opposed  to  lex,  which  is  an  especial  written  en- 
actment— strictly  a  transaction  entered  into  be- 
tween the  magistrate  and  the  people.  We  must 
observe,  however,  that  the  term  lex  is  sometimes 
used  for  law  of  every  kind ; — as  where  natura 
being  made  the  equivalent  of  jus  gentium,  the 
term  "  leges  "  is  employed  for  jus  civile.^    Still  in 

*  (The  Theory  of  the  State,  p.  30,  Reprinted  from  Proceedings 
of  the  American  Philos.  See.,  Vol.  XXXIV.) 
2  (Cicero  De  Off.  III.,  V.,  g  23.) 


178  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

its  strict  sense  of  a  written  enactment  it  is  al- 
ways opposed  to  jios.  And  again  we  must  ob- 
serve that  jus  (or  rather  jura)  may  be  used  to 
express  a  rule  or  set  of  rules  of  law  contained  in 
a  lex  or  part  of  a  lex,  but  it  is  never  confounded 
with  it.  The  reason  for  this  is  that  the  term^W 
(or  jura)  is  often  taken  in  a  strict  ethical  sense 
to  mean  that  which  is  right  or  lawful,  that  is,  a 
rule,  or  rules,  of  law  that  have  received  exposi- 
tion in  a  lex. 

"  The  law  of  Rome  was  originally  a  body  of 
customary  law  ;  and  though  it  came  in  course  of 
time  to  be  based  on  statute,  custom  was  still  re- 
garded as  one  of  its  original  sources.  This  is  the 
jus  which  is  said  to  be  morihus  constitutum — 
not  to  be  confounded  with  ho7ii  mores.  The 
ultimate  foundation  of  customary  law  was  con- 
sidered to  be  the  common  consciousness  of  the 
people  of  following  a  custom  in  obedience  to  a 
rule  of  law :  the  evidence  of  this  consciousness  is 
usage— repeated  and  continued  use — '  lo7iga,  in- 
veterata,  diuturna,  antiquitus  jprobata  et  servata 
tenaciter  consuetudo.^  .  .  .  The  Eoman  writ- 
ers indeed  frequently  refer  to  a  large  part  of 
their  law  as  founded  on  mores  or  on  the  mos  ma- 
jorum,  and  not  on  Leges.  Thus,  Ulpian  says  that 
the  jus  jpatrim  potestatis  is  morihus  receptum.^^  ^ 

'  (Smith,  Die.  of  Greek  and  Roman  Antiquities,  Third  Ed., 
Vol.  I.,  p.  1042.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  179 

Let  me  draw  your  attention  also  to  the  fact 
that  the  Digest  of  the  Roman  Law  of  Justinian 
begins/  "  The  Jus  Civile  or  civil  law  of  Rome  is 
divided  into  jus  inMiGiim  and  jits  prwatum, 
Puhlicum  jus  is  defined  to  be  that  which  has  re- 
gard to  the  condition  of  the  commonwealth 
{quod  ad  statum  rei  Homanoe  s;pectat).  Priva- 
tum jus  that  which  has  regard  to  the  welfare 
of  individuals  {quod  ad  singidorem  titilitatem).^^ 
In  Section  9  under  said  book  and  title,  Gains 
says :  "  All  people  who  are  governed  by  law  and 
custom  {legihus  et  morihus)  use  partly  their  own 
law  {jios)  and  partly  that  which  is  common  to 
all  mankind.  For  the  law  {jus)  which  a  people 
establishes  for  itself  is  peculiar  to  that  state,  and 
is  called  jus  civile,  as  the  law  {jus)  peculiar  to 
that  state.  But  the  law  {jus)  which  reason  has 
established  as  natural  among  all  mankind,  is 
equally  observed  among  all,  and  is  called  ^^^^  gen- 
tium, as  being  that  law  {jtcs)  which  all  nations 
igentes)  use." 

It  is  under  Title  III.  of  said  Book  L,  Section  1, 
that  lex  is  defined  by  Papinian.  "Lex  is  the 
common  precept,  the  counsel  of  wise  men,  the 
punishment  of  crimes  which  through  wilfulness 
or  ignorance  have  been  committed,  the  common 
agreement  of  the  republic."  Under  Section  7  of 
said  Title  and  Book,  the  virtue  of  law  {lex)  is 
'  (Book  I.,  Title  I.,  Section  1.) 


180  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

said  to  be  "  to  command,  to  forbid,  to  permit,  to 
punish."  The  difference  between ^'^^^^  and  lex  in 
the  Koman  law  is  seen  at  once.  Indeed,  in  the 
works  of  the  Eoman  writers  and  jurists,  lex  is 
ahnost  invariably  used  to  denote  an  enactment 
of  any  body  (or  even  individual)  constitutionally 
empowered  to  legislate.  Properly  it  was  used 
to  denote  the  enactments  of  the  Comitia  Centii- 
riata,  although,  as  I  have  said,  it  afterward  came 
to  have  a  more  extended  meaning,  wh^njus  was 
taken  to  mean  the  thing  that  was  right. 

Strange  that  Austin  and  his  followers  should 
have  lost  sight  of  the  distinction  the  Eomans 
themselves  drew  between  jus  (that  which  is  right 
or  just)  and  lex  (that  which  is  agreed  upon  and 
commanded).  How  did  it  come  about  ?  Through 
the  desire  of  men,  as  I  believe,  to  find  some  ulti- 
mate and  exact  source  of  law,  through  their  ef- 
forts to  find  an  authority  for  all  rules  of  con- 
duct; through  their  dread  of  depending  upon 
custom  or  opinion  for  the  revelation  of  right ; 
through  their  misprision  of  human  nature. 

And  so  we  turn  to  the  historical  or  ethical 
school  of  jurists  and  ask  them  to  tell  us  what  they 
found  to  be  the  way  law  came  into  being  and  ef- 
fect. Sir  Henry  Maine,  in  a  well-known  passage 
of  his  treatise  on  ancient  law,  says :  "  The  ear- 
liest notions  connected  with  the  conception,  now 
so  fully  developed,  of  a  law  or  rule  of  life  are 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  181 

those  contained  in  the  Homeric  words  *  Themis ' 
and  '  Themistes.'  ^  Themis,'  it  is  well  known, 
appears  in  the  later  Greek  pantheon  as  the  God- 
dess of  Justice,  but  this  is  a  modern  and  much 
developed  idea,  and  it  is  in  a  very  different  sense 
that  Themis  is  described  in  the  Iliad  as  the  as- 
sessor of  Zeus.  .  .  .  When  a  king  decided  a 
dispute  by  a  sentence,  the  judgment  was  assumed 
to  be  the  result  of  direct  inspiration.  The  divine 
agent,  suggesting  judicial  awards  to  kings  or  to 
the  gods,  the  greatest  of  the  kings,  was  Themis. 
The  peculiarity  of  the  conception  is  brought  out 
by  the  use  of  the  plural.  Them.istes^  Themises, 
the  plural  of  Themis,  are  the  awards  themselves 
divinely  dictated  by  the  judge.  Kings  are  spoken 
of  as  if  they  had  a  store  of  '  Themistes  '  ready  to 
hand  for  use ;  but  it  must  be  distinctly  under- 
stood that  they  are  not  laws,  but  judgments. 
*Zeus,  or  the  human  king  on  earth,'  says  Mr. 
Grote  in  his  History  of  Greece,  '  is  not  a  law- 
maker, but  a  judge.' "  ^  And  in  this  connection  I 
would  cite  the  words  of  Mr.  Edward  Jenks  in 
his  admirable  work  on  "  Law  and  Politics  in  the 
Middle  Ages."^  "  As  we  go  back  upon  the  his- 
tory of  Law,  we  very  soon  reach  a  point  at  which 
the  Austinian  theory  is  helpless  to  explain  the 
facts.  Here  is  a  ^  source '  of  law,  an  authority 
which,  for  some  reason  or  another,  great  masses 

»  (Chap,  i.,  p.  3,  et  seq. )  ^  (  Chap,  i.,  p.  2. ) 


182  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  men  feel  themselves  bound  to  follow,  not  be- 
cause they  choose,  but  because  they  must.  And 
yet  it  is  certainly  not  a  command  of  the  State, 
direct  or  indirect.  Upon  critical  examination  it 
may  turn  out  to  be  the  work  of  a  mere  private 
composer.  Why  do  men  obey  it  ?  Further  back 
again,  we  find  a  purely  impersonal  document, 
compiled,  no  one  knows  exactly  how  or  by 
whom,  and  yet  it  is  the  controlling  force  which 
shapes  the  daily  conduct  of  men.  They  do  not 
even  consider  the  possibility  of  disregarding  it.  It 
is  not  the  work  of  the  State,  it  may  not  even  be 
recognized  by  the  State,  there  may  be  no  State  to 
recognize  it.  Yet  the  essential  ideas  of  Law,  the 
evident  ancestors -of  our  modern  juristic  notions, 
are  clearly  there." 

But  we  must  not  understand  that  the  kings 
and  judges  of  ancient  times,  nor  yet  the  compil- 
ers of  law  of  the  Middle  Ages,  sought  for  the 
thing  that  was  abstractly  just.  Human  law  was 
not  originally  based  upon  equity,  but  rather  upon 
custom  and  family  observances.  "Man,"  says 
M.  Fustel  de  Coulanges,  "believed  that  the 
sacred  hearth,  in  virtue  of  the  religious  law, 
passed  from  father  to  son ;  from  this  it  followed 
that  the  house  was  hereditary  property.  The 
man  who  had  buried  his  father  in  his  field  be- 
lieved that  the  spirit  of  the  dead  one  took  posses- 
sion of  this  field  forever,  and  required  a  perpetual 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  183 

worship  of  his  posterity.  As  a  result  of  this,  the 
field,  the  domain  of  the  dead,  and  place  of  sacri- 
fice, became  the  inalienable  property  of  a  family. 
Religion  said,  *  The  son  continues  the  worship — 
not  the  daughter ; '  and  the  law  said,  with  the 
religion,  '  The  son  inherits — the  daughter  does 
not  inherit;  the  nephew  by  the  males  inherits, 
but  not  the  nephew  on  the  female  side.'  This 
was  the  manner  in  which  the  laws  were  made. 
They  presented  themselves  without  being 
sought."  ^  In  other  words,  the  laws  arose  neces- 
sarily out  of  the  conditions  of  the  patriarchal 
family,  and  the  patriarchal  family  rested,  as  we 
know,  upon  religious  observances.  We  find  this 
last  fact  attested  to  as  strongly  by  the  status  of 
the  family  under  the  Mosaic  dispensation  as  in 
the  early  histories  of  Greece  and  Eome. 

From  this  idea  of  a  divine  agency  suggesting 
judgments  in  especial  cases  that  would  uphold 
the  family  and  family  religion,  there  is  a  wide 
difference  to  the  conception  of  the  Deity  dictat- 
ing an  entire  code  or  body  of  law ;  yet  to  this 
conception  most  ancient  peoples  came,  and  they 
came  to  it  logically.  The  Cretans  attributed 
their  laws  to  Jupiter  and  not  to  Minos  ;  the 
Lacedemonians  believed  that  their  legislator  was 
Apollo  and  not  Lycurgus ;  the  Romans  believed 
that  Numa  wrote  under  the  direct  inspiration  of 
»  (The  Ancient  City,  Book  III.,  Chap,  xi.,  p.  251.) 


184  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  goddess  Egeria ;  and  both  the  Hindus  and  the 
Hebrews  held  that  the  laws  of  Manu  and  of 
Moses  respectively  were  given  directly  by  God 
Himself.  That  we  hold  together  with  the  He- 
brews that  their  laws  were  God-given  is  not  the 
question  now.  Nor  is  the  question  the  reason 
why  we  believe  this.  The  question  is  simply  the 
well-nigh  universal  phenomenon  of  belief  current 
among  men,  that  God,  or  the  gods,  at  one  time 
inspired  men  directly  to  pronounce  judgments  ; 
and  at  another  gave  a  body  or  bodies  of  laws  to 
mankind. 

And  these  bodies  of  law,  upon  what  did  they 
rest  ?  Upon  the  family  and  upon  the  religious 
observances  of  the  family.  Yet  not  entirely  upon 
these,  upon  also  the  character  of  the  god  or  gods 
who  inspired  them.  Men's  idea  of  the  beings 
they  worshipped  (however  they  acquired  them) 
gave  rise  invariably  to  their  earliest  ideas  of 
right  or  justice.  And  this  is  the  glory  of  the 
Mosaic  dispensation,  as  received  and  acted  upon 
by  the  Hebrews.  Moses'  idea  of  God  was  great 
and  glorious.  It  was  only  as  God  Almighty  that 
the  Deity  had  been  known  to  the  patriarchs ;  * 
but  to  Moses  was  God  known  by  the  name  Je- 
hovah, by,  as  we  understand.  His  inner  attri- 
butes ;  and  these  inner  attributes  were  revealed 
in  the  proclamation  wherein  God  declared  Him- 

'  (Exodus  vi.  3.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  185 

self  to  be  "  the  Lord,  the  Lord,  a  God  full  of 
compassion  and  gracious,  slow  to  anger,  and 
plenteous  in  mercy  and  truth;  keeping  mercy 
for  thousands,  forgiving  iniquity  and  transgres- 
sion and  sin :  and  that  will  by  no  means  clear 
the  guilty ;  visiting  the  iniquity  of  the  fathers 
upon  the  children,  and  upon  the  children's  chil- 
dren, upon  the  third  and  upon  the  fourth  genera- 
tion." ^ 

It  was  by,  or  from  out,  this  great  personality 
that  the  laws  of  the  Hebrews  were  given,  and 
they  found  their  truest  exposition  therein.  And 
hence  there  arose  among  the  Hebrews  very  early 
in  their  history  the  great  idea  of  divine  and  ab- 
stract justice.  Jehovah  was  full  of  compassion, 
and  plenteous  in  mercy,  forgiving  iniquity  and 
transgression  and  sin,  but  He  would  by  no  means 
clear  the  guilty,  rather  would  He  visit  iniquity 
upon  the  family  of  the  transgressor  for  three  or 
four  generations.  Herein  it  is  shown  that  it  is 
not  so  much  the  doing  of  the  things  that  fulfil 
the  law  of  ordinances  (as  necessary  as  they  were 
by  the  Levitical  system)  that  are  pleasing  to 
Jehovah,  and  therefore  just,  but  the  avoiding  of 
things  that  are  essentially  wrong  and  iniquitous, 
the  becoming,  and  being  compassionate  and  gen- 
erous, kind,  merciful  and  truthful  toward  man,  as 
Jehovah  was ;  yet  not  forgetting  to  punish  the 
'  (Exod.  xxxiv.  5,  6,  7,  B.  V.) 


186  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

guilty.  Above  the  law  there  always  stood  the 
supreme  idea  of  the  justice  of  God,  and  the  same 
idea,  it  was  obvious,  ought  to  be  found  in  man. 
Again  and  again  the  prophets  tried  to  make  the 
people  understand  this,  but  they  would  not  act 
upon  the  truth;  they  invariably  preferred  the 
Levitical  ordinances  to  the  essence  and. spirit  of 
the  Law.  Nothing  could  be  plainer  than  the 
words  of  Micah:  "He  hath  showed  thee,  O 
man,  what  is  good ;  and  what  doth  the  Lord  re- 
quire of  thee,  but  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy, 
and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God."  ^  And  yet 
Christ  said,  some  hundreds  of  years  after,  to  the 
men  of  His  generation,  "  Ye  tithe  mint  and  anise 
and  cummin,  and  have  left  undone  the  weightier 
matters  of  the  law,  judgment  and  mercy  and 
faith  :  but  these  ye  ought  to  have  done,  and  not 
to  have  left  the  other  undone."  ^ 

But  the  idea  of  justice  arose  in  an  entirely 
different  way  among  the  classical  peoples.  "  More 
than  once,"  says  Sir  Henry  Maine,  "  the  juris- 
prudence of  Western  Europe  has  reached  a  stage 
at  which  the  ideas  which  presided  over  the  original 
body  of  rules  are  found  to  have  been  driven  out 
and  replaced  by  a  wholly  new  group  of  notions, 
which  have  exercised  a  strong  and  in  some  cases 
an  exclusively  controlling  influence  on  all  the 
subsequent  modifications   of   the   law.     Such  a 

»  (vi.  8,  R.  V.)  2  (Matt,  xxiii.  23,  E.  v.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  187 

period  was  arrived  at  in  Koman  law,  when  the 
theory  of  a  Law  of  Nature  substituted  itself  for 
the  notions  which  lawyers  and  politicians  had 
formed  for  themselves  concerning  the  origin  and 
sanctions  of  the  rules  which  governed  the  ancient 
city.  A  similar  displacement  of  the  newer  legal 
theory  took  place  when  the  Koman  law,  long 
since  affected  in  all  its  parts  by  the  doctrine  of 
Natural  Law,  became,  for  certain  purposes  and 
within  certain  limits,  the  Canon  law — a  source  of 
modern  law  which  has  not  yet  been  sufficiently 
explored."  ^ 

Let  us  ask  ourselves  how  it  was  that  the  law  of 
nature  came  into  being  and  usurped  the  place  of 
the  older  sanctions  for  the  rules  of  the  Koman 
law?  The  question  has  been  confused  by  the 
poetical  conception  of  a  golden  age  of  man,  ex- 
isting before  the  organization  of  man  in  society, 
creeping  into  juristic  writings,  but  this  concep- 
tion plays  but  little  part  in  the  development  of 
the  jurisprudence  of  Kome,  and  cannot  be  said  to 
have  become  popular  in  the  world  until  the  time 
when  Kousseau  adopted  it.  The  Koman  doctrine 
of  Jus  naturale  originated  with  Aristotle ;  and 
that  in  his  mind  it  had  no  connection  with  the 
impossible  hypothesis  of  a  golden  state  of  nature, 
is  shown  by  his  definition  of  man,  as  being,  by 
nature,  a  political  animal,  and  by  his  conception 
'  (Village  Communities,  Lect.  i.,  p.  19.) 


188  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  justice  as  "complete  virtue,  although  not 
complete  in  an  absolute  sense  but  in  relation  to 
one's  neighbors,"  ^  and  "  political  justice,  i.  e.^ 
such  justice  as  exists  among  people  who  are  asso- 
ciated in  a  common  life  with  a  view  to  independ- 
ence "  ^  as  the  only  kind  of  justice ;  for  man  is  al- 
ways found  in  the  social  or  political  state,  and  al- 
ways therefore  subject  to  political  law. 

Aristotle  alleged  further,  that  "  political  jus- 
tice is  partly  natural  and  partly  conventional. 
The  part  which  is  natural  is  that  which  has  the 
same  authority  everywhere,  and  is  independent 
of  opinion ;  that  which  is  conventional  is  such 
that  it  does  not  matter  in  the  first  instance 
whether  it  takes  one  form  or  another,  it  only 
matters  when  it  has  been  laid  down,  e.  g.,  that  the 
ransom  of  a  prisoner  should  be  a  mina,  or  that  a 
goat  and  not  two  sheep  should  be  offered  in 
sacrifice,  and  all  legislative  enactments  which  are 
made  in  particular  cases,  as  the  sacrifice  in  honor 
of  Brasidas  at  Amphipolis,  and  the  provisions  of 
an  Act  of  Parliament."^  It  was  this  distinction 
that '  was  made  by  Aristotle  between  "  the 
natural"  and  "the  conventional,"  that  the 
Koman  jurists  adopted.  They  began  to  regard 
the  law  as  consisting  of  two  parts,  namely,  the 
jus  gentium  or  naUirale,  and  ilnQJus  civile,  even 

'  (Ethics,  Book  V.,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  137,  Welldon's  Translation.) 
« ild.,  Chap.  X.,  p.  157.)  3  {Id.,  p.  159.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  189 

as  we  have  seen  in  the  definition  of  Gains  given 
in  the  Pandects.  But  the  jus  naturale  had  no 
relation  in  the  beginning  to  the  fancied  state  of 
nature  in  a  golden  age.  It  is  probable  that  the 
idea  of  jus  gentiuin  took  its  rise  before  the 
kindred  idea  of  natural  justice  came  in  to  sub- 
stantiate the  thought  of  what  was  just  among 
men ;  but  it  was  nevertheless  enlarged  by  it  when 
the  lawyers  began  to  study  and  to  treat  the  law 
from  the  standpoint  of  philosophy. 

We  have  seen  how  the  jus  gentiicm  came  into 
existence,  through  the  concourse  of  many  people 
of  the  old  Italian  tribes  in  Kome  who  could  not 
be  judged  by  the  jus  civile,  because  they  were 
not  Quirites,  and  who  could  therefore  not  have 
the  benefit  of  the  Quiritarian  law.  Therefore  it 
was  that  the  Pra3tors  resorted  to  the  expedient 
of  selecting  the  rules  of  law  common  to  Eome 
and  the  different  communities  from  which  the 
immigrants  came.  The  Praetors  for  some  hun- 
dreds of  years  issued  at  the  beginning  of  their 
respective  terms  of  office  an  edict  setting  forth 
the  rules  which  would  govern  them  in  their  office 
of  judge,  and  it  became  the  custom  for  each 
Praetor  to  issue  his  predecessor's  edict,  with  such 
changes  and  additions  as  seemed  to  him  wise  and 
expedient.  The  Praetors'  proclamations  thus  be- 
came lengthened  year  by  year,  and  obtained  the 
name  of  the  perpetual  edict,  until  the  issuance  of 


190  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  edict  of  Salvius  Julianus,  in  the  reign  of  the 
Emperor  Hadrian.  He  arranged  the  edict  in  a 
systematic  order ;  hence  the  edict  was  subse- 
quently called  by  the  Koman  lawyers  the  "  edict 
of  Julianus." 

Herein  in  the  edicts,  as  promulgated  by  the 
Pr^tors,  came  the  opportunity  of  influence  of 
Grecian  thought  and  philosophy.  It  was  the 
Stoical  philosophers,  we  observe,  who  took  up  the 
idea  of  living  according  to  the  law  of  nature  and 
made  it  popular  ;  and  the  Stoical  philosophy  be- 
came the  prevalent  philosophy  of  Eome.  The 
alliance  of  the  lawyers  with  Stoical  philosophy 
continued  through  many  centuries,  and  the  long 
diffusion  of  the  ideas  of  the  philosophers  among 
the  members  of  the  juristic  profession  was  sure 
to  affect  greatly  the  art  which  they  practiced. 
But  we  must  not  look  to  see  any  number  of 
Stoical  dogmas  incorporated  in  the  body  of  the 
Koman  law.  The  influence  of  Stoicism  is  not 
perceived  in  the  number  of  specific  doctrines 
which  it  contributed  to  the  law,  but  rather  in  the 
single  idea  it  lent  to  it  of  natural  law  or  justice. 
After  nature  had  become  a  household  word  in  the 
mouths  of  the  Komans,  the  belief  gradually 
spread  among  the  lawyers  that  jus  gentium,  ay  as 
in  fact  nothing  other  t\\2^>njus  naturale,  and  that 
the  Praetor  in  forming  his  edict  on  the  principle 
of  jus  gentium^  was   gradually  approaching   a 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  191 

type  of  natural  or  divine  justice.  It  is  true,  that 
in  the  minds  of  some  of  the  Roman  lawyers 
there  arose  a  conception  of  nature  as  a  state  of 
the  people  that  had  been  lost,  but,  for  the  most 
part,  the  teaching  of  Aristotle  was  not  departed 
from,  as  we  can  see  in  the  definitions  of  law  al- 
ready given  from  the  Pandects.  In  other  words, 
the  idea  that  became  prevalent  among  the  Roman 
lawyers,  through  the  working  upon  the  jus 
gentium  of  the  jus  naturale^  and  their  identifica- 
tion, was  that  justice  and  right  is  a  part  of  the 
law.  And  this  idea,  we  have  seen,  was  the  Jew- 
ish idea,  as  the  same  received  exposition  by 
Moses  and  the  prophets.  This  is  not  to  say 
that  the  Roman  law  became  like  the  Jewish, 
but  only  that  justice  became  the  end  and 
aim  of  the  one  and  the  other.  And  thus  the 
civil  law  came  into  line  with  philosophy  and  re- 
ligion. 

We  have  seen  that  it  was  the  Stoical  philoso- 
phy which  furnished  the  Roman  lawyers  with 
the  idea  of  a  state  of  nature  and  led  them  to  the 
thought  and  definition  of  Aristotle.  But  whence 
did  the  Stoical  philosophers  get  their  impulse  and 
the  moral  earnestness,  which  is  their  most  honor- 
able characteristic?  Zeno,  the  founder  of  the 
school  of  the  Porch,  was  a  native  of  Citium,  a 
Phoenician  colony  in  Crete,  and  probably  of 
Semitic  ancestry.     He  is  called  "the  Phoenician." 


192  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

To  Eastern  affinities  Stoicism  was  without  doubt 
largely  indebted  for  the  features  which  distin- 
guishes it  from  other  schools  of  Grecian  philoso- 
phy. The  contrast  between  the  light,  reckless 
gaiety  of  the  Hellenic  spirit,  as  witnessed  to  in 
the  school  of  Epicurus,  the  other  of  the  two  last 
phases  of  classical  philosophy,  and  the  stern,  un- 
bending, almost  fanatical  ideas  of  the  philosophy 
of  Zeno,  is  as  complete  as  can  be  imagined. 
"  Stoicism  was  in  fact  the  earliest  offspring  of  the 
union  between  the  religious  consciousness  of  the 
East  and  the  intellectual  culture  of  the  West. 
The  recognition  of  the  claims  of  the  individual 
soul,  the  sense  of  personal  responsibility,  the 
habit  of  judicial  introspection,  in  short,  the  sub- 
jective view  of  ethics,  were  in  no  sense  new,  for 
they  are  known  to  have  held  sway  over  the  mind 
of  the  chosen  people  from  the  earliest  dawn  of 
their  history  as  a  nation.  But  now  for  the  first 
time,  they  presented  themselves  at  the  doors  of 
Western  civilization  and  demanded  admission. 
The  occasion  was  eminently  favorable.  The  con- 
quests of  Alexander,  which  rendered  the  fusion 
of  the  East  and  West  for  the  first  time  possible, 
also  evoked  the  moral  need  which  they  had  thus 
supplied  the  means  of  satisfying.  By  the  over- 
throw of  the  state  the  importance  of  the  indi- 
vidual was  enhanced.  In  the  failure  of  political 
relations,  men  were  thrown  back  on  their  inward 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  193 

resources  and  led  to  examine  their  moral  wants 
and  to  educate  their  moral  faculties."  ^ 

But  though  the  element  of  Stoicism  was  de- 
rived from  the  East  and  received  its  first  devel- 
opment in  Grecian  soil,  its  practical  success  was 
best  attained  in  the  field  of  Eome.  It  is  this 
later,  or  Eoman,  period,  which  has  attracted  to 
itself  so  much  attention,  and  this  not  only  be- 
cause its  practical  influence  became  most  mani- 
fest in  the  lives  of  the  Komans,  but  because  it 
became  so  great  a  power  in  the  development 
of  the  civil  law.  In  the  time  of  the  Antonine 
Caesars,  which  men  agree  to  be  the  golden  age 
of  Eoman  jurisprudence,  the  most  renowned  ju- 
rists were  associated  with  Stoicism,  and  many 
were  the  actual  disciples  of  that  philosophy. 
Herein  we  see,  in  corroboration  of  what  has 
gone  before,  the  influence  of  religion,  or  better, 
of  morality,  upon  philosophy,  and  of  moral  phi- 
losophy, or  better,  of  ethics,  upon  law ;  the  ten- 
dency being  ever  stronger  and  stronger  toward 
justice  and  right.  Let  us  see  what  the  influence 
of  the  greatest  religious  and  moral  teacher  of  the 
world  has  been  upon  the  law  or  body  of  laws  of 
the  world ;  for  all  the  world  recognizes  to-day 
that  the  common  law,  or  body  of  common  law, 
of  civilized  society  is  one  and  the  same,  and  that 
it  is  essentially  that  law  that  was  developed  in 
'  (Lightfoot,  Dissertations  on  the  Apostolic  Age,  iv.,  p.  253.) 


194  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

Eome,  and  became  under  Justinian  the  Cor_piis 
Juris  Civilis. 

Many  English  jurists  have  striven  to  show 
that  the  common  law  of  England  was  some- 
thing other.  It  is  true  that  it  was  something- 
other  in  its  origin,  yet  a  knowledge  of  the  con- 
ditions of  the  life  of  the  English  people  as  re- 
vealed in  "  Domsday  Book  and  Beyond,"  ^  must 
soon  convince  an  impartial  reader  that  there  was 
very  little  that  can  properly  be  called  "  law  "  be- 
fore the  l^orman  conquest.  There  were  customs, 
of  course,  and  rights  and  responsibilities,  but  little 
or  nothing  of  jurisprudence.  Mr.  Jenks,  who  is 
one  of  the  many  writers  who  have  minimized  the 
effect  of  the  Roman  law  upon  the  law  of  Eng- 
land, is  yet  found  to  say,^  "  At  the  time  of  the 
E^orman  conquest  England  is  from  a  legal  stand- 
point the  most  backward  of  all  Teutonic  coun- 
tries save  only  Scandinavia."  But  the  Norman 
conquest  soon  effected  a  great  change.  "  As  sol- 
diers, as  ecclesiastics,  as  administrators,  above  all 
as  jurists,  they  (the  Normans)  had  no  equals,  at 
least  North  of  the  Alps."^  It  is  known  and  un- 
derstood by  all  who  have  studied  these  times  that 
they  had  been  trained  by  Lanfranc  and  Anselm, 
the  great  Prior  and  the  great  Abbot  of  Bee,  who 

1  (Maitland,  Three  Essays  in  the  Early  History  of  England. ) 
'  TLaw  and  Politics  in  the  Middle  Ages,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  32.) 
^{Id.,  p.  33.) 


TEE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  195 

were  Italians  and  who  were  well  acquainted  with 
the  Civil  and  with  the  Canon  law.  These  tAvo 
ecclesiastics  afterward  occupied  in  succession  the 
primary  see  of  Canterbury  for  nearly  forty  years. 
We  observe,  with  Mr.  Jenks,  that  the  immediate 
effect  of  the  conquest  upon  the  history  of  law  in 
England  was  to  set  aside  all  the  local  laws  and 
to  set  up  a  "  common  law  "  for  all  the  land,  be- 
cause England  became  one  great  fief  in  the  hands 
of  the  king  and  was  to  have  one  law.  The  phrase 
"  common  law  "  was  not  new,  however ;  canon- 
ists had  used  it  in  speaking  of  the  general  law  of 
the  church  as  distinguished  from  local  customs 
of  particular  countries.  The  English  judges  and 
jurists  borrowed  the  term  from  the  Canon  law 
and  applied  it  to  the  law  of  the  royal  court. 
And  they  borrowed  from  the  same  source  many 
rules  and  principles  and  doctrines.^  And  the 
Canon  Law,  though  based  directly  upon  the  can- 
ons of  councils,  the  sentences  of  the  fathers,  the 
decretals,  true  or  false,  of  the  popes,  and  the 
canonical  replies  made  to  questions  put  at  vari- 
ous times  to  the  Eoman  pontiffs,  is  yet  rooted  in 
the  Civil  law  of  Kome,  and  draws  from  it  much 
of  its  strength  and  vitality.  But  the  English 
judges  and  jurists  did  not  only  resort  to  the 
Canon  law  and  thus  to  the  Civil  for  instruction 
and  inspiration,  they  turned  to  the  Corjpus  Juris 

'  {Id.,  Chap,  iv.,  p.  119.) 


196  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

directly.  "Whole  texts  were  taken  from  it  with 
the  terms  unaltered,  though  their  origin  was 
never  acknowledged  by  the  older  justices  and 
chancellors  of  the  realm.  The  most  striking 
illustration  of  this  fact  is  found  in  the  treatise 
of  Bracton,  with  reference  to  which  Sir  Henry 
Maine  makes  the  following  observation :  "  That 
an  English  writer  of  the  time  of  Henry  III. 
should  have  been  able  to  put  off  on  his  country- 
men as  a  composition  of  pure  English  law  a  trea- 
tise of  which  the  entire  form  and  a  third  of  the 
contents  were  directly  borrowed  from  the  Corjnis 
Juris^  and  that  he  should  have  ventured  on  this 
experiment  in  a  country  where  the  systematic 
study  of  the  Koman  law  was  formerly  proscribed, 
will  always  be  among  the  most  hopeless  enigmas 
in  the  history  of  jurisprudence."^ 

The  philosophy  of  the  rise  of  the  law  in  the 
middle  ages  is  as  it  seems  to  me  expressed  by 
Maitland.^  Speaking  of  the  legal  ideas  in  which 
feudalism  is  expressed,  he  says :  "  If  we  approach 
them  from  the  standpoint  of  modern  law,  if  we 
approach  them  from  the  standpoint  of  the  clas- 
sical Eoman  law,  they  are  confused  ideas.  In 
particular,  no  clear  line  is  drawn  between  public 
and  private  law."  But  the  question  arises  whether 
we  are  right  in  applying  to  this  state  of  things 

'  (Ancient  Law,  Chap,  iv.,  p.  79.) 

"^  (Domsday  Book  and  Beyond,  Essay  II.,  p.  224.) 


TEE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  197 

such  a  word  as  ^' *  confusion,'  a  word  which  im- 
plies that  things  that  once  were  distinct  have 
wrongfully  or  unfortunately  become  mixed  up 
with  each  other,  a  word  which  implies  error  or 
retrogression.  ]N"ow,  no  doubt,  from  one  point  of 
view,  namely,  that  of  universal  history,  we  do  see 
confusion  and  retrogression.  Ideal  possessions 
which  have  been  won  for  mankind  by  the  thought 
of  the  Koman  lawyers  are  lost  for  a  long  while 
and  must  be  recovered  painfully.  Lines  that  have 
been  traced  with  precision  are  smudged  out,  and 
then  they  must  be  traced  once  more.  If  we  re- 
gard western  Europe  as  a  whole,  this  retrogres- 
sion appears  as  a  slow  change."  ^  Certainly  there 
was  no  "  confusion  "  when  we  regard  the  law  of 
the  peoples  of  the  middle  ages  in  relation  to  their 
own  earlier  and  primitive  law ;  but  there  was 
great  "  confusion  "  when  we  regard  their  law  in 
relation  to  the  Civil  law  of  Kome.  And  this 
was  the  effort  of  the  barbarous  peoples  of  western 
Europe  during  the  dark  days  of  their  history — 
to  push  back  and  nearer  to  the  clear  shining 
light  of  the  Corpus  Juris  Civilis.  The  process 
was  slow  and  painful  and  the  steps  by  which  the 
retrogression  was  made  were  often  obscure,  but 
little  by  little  the  great  principles  of  the  Koman 
law  were  recovered   and  became  the  common 


{Id.) 


198  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

property  of  the  canonists  and  jurists,  and  then 
of  the  peoples  of  Europe. 

We  have  seen  that  law  took  its  rise  in  the 
dicta  of  kings  and  the  customs  of  the  family, 
which  customs  were  always  religious.  We  have 
seen  also  that  the  idea  of  law  being  and  becom- 
ing just  arose  in  Israel  out  of  the  idea  of  the 
justice  of  Jehovah,  and  in  Eome  out  of  the  com- 
mon agreement  of  the  neighboring  gentes  in  what 
was  right  or  just.  And  in  Koman  law  we  have 
seen,  moreover,  that  the  idea  of  justice  was  en- 
larged by  the  philosophy  of  the  Greeks,  and 
more  especially  by  that  of  Aristotle,  that  there 
is  a  common  law,  or  jus  7iaturale,  that  pertains 
to  all  civilized  men.  And,  lastly,  we  have  seen 
how  this  idea  of  ihQJus  naturale  was  associated 
with  the  principal  tenet  of  Stoicism,  to  live  ac- 
cording to  nature.  And  Stoicism,  we  have 
learned,  was  a  seed  brought  from  the  eastern 
soil  of  rightness  of  conduct,  nourished  by  the 
thought  of  the  Greeks  and  brought  to  maturity 
by  the  practical  turn  of  mind  of  the  Eomans. 
Dicta  and  custom  and  tribal  observances  and 
natural  right  and  personal  morality  have  thus 
been  brought  together  in  the  development  of  the 
law.  Our  task  is  now  to  see  what  the  teaching 
of  Christ  has  done  for  its  progress  and  expansion. 

But  first  we  must  recognize  that,  although  in 
the  abstract  questions  of  right  and  wrong  pre- 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  199 

sent  many  difficulties,  yet  in  the  concrete  most 
of  them  disappear,  and  thus  there  results  a  una- 
nimity in  the  moral  judgments  of  mankind  in 
regard  to  the  common  actions  of  man,  in  the 
same,  and  often  in  different  states  of  civilization, 
which  would  be  wonderful  were  it  not  for  the 
fact  of  our  belief  in  the  unity  of  the  race  and  in 
its  divine  origin.  Thus,  for  instance,  no  man 
within  the  pale  of  civilization  can  contemplate 
an  act  of  robbery  or  murder  with  approbation, 
nor  does  any  person  regard  the  retention  of  a 
pledge  when  payment  of  a  loan  has  been  made 
as  right,  and  all  men  have  held  that  for  every 
kind  of  injury  done  some  compensation  should 
be  made.  It  is  such  principles  as  these  that  fur- 
nish the  test  by  which  the  various  theories  of 
morality  are  to  be  judged,  and  it  is  to  them  that 
the  advocates  of  all  theories  make  their  last  ap- 
peal. "But  the  difficulty,"  says  Mr.  Smith, 
"  consists  in  expressing  satisfactorily  the  ultimate 
test  or  criterion  by  which  conduct  is  to  be 
judged  ;  and  on  this  point  the  wildest  difference 
of  opinion  prevails."  ^ 

It  is  not  necessary  for  me  to  show  how  the 
differences  as  to  the  test  and  criterion  of  conduct 
arose ;  nor  to  what  results,  theoretical  and  prac- 
tical, they  have  led.  I  wish  rather  to  point  you 
to  a  fact  which  most  publicists  have  partly,  if 
1  (The  Theory  of  the  State,  p.  106. ) 


200  TEE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

not  wholly,  ignored  in  their  endeavors  to  find  an 
end  that  ought  to  regulate  conduct ;  and  that  is 
the  fact  that,  since  the  gospel  has  been  preached, 
men  have  had  as  a  means  of  measurement 
(within  Christendom  at  least)  the  mind  of  Christ, 
and  that  consciously  or  unconsciously  they  have 
ever  consulted  it.  It  was  the  Grecian  philosopher 
Protagoras,  who  said  that,  "  man  is  the  measure 
of  all  things ,  of  the  things  that  are,  that  they 
are,  of  the  things  that  are  not,  that  they  are  not. 
Just  as  each  thing  appears  to  each  man  so  is  it 
for  him.  All  truth  is  relative.  The  existence  of 
the  gods  is  uncertain."^  Therefore,  man,  or 
man's  thought,  according  to  Protagoras,  is  the 
sole  test  or  criterion  of  what  is  just  and  right. 
With  Plato  there  came  in  a  newer  and  higher 
view  of  life  and  conduct.  This  deep  thinker  re- 
ferred everything  to  God.  The  Platonic  philos- 
ophy centred  in  the  Theory  of  Ideas,  and  the 
highest  idea  was  the  idea  of  the  good,  which  is 
God.  Speaking  of  God,  the  creator  and  artificer 
of  the  universe,  Plato  says,  "  He  was  good ;  and 
in  the  good  envy  is  never  engendered  about 
anything  whatever.  Hence,  being  free  from 
this  (envy)  He  desired  that  all  things  should  as 
much  as  possible  resemble  himself."  ^  God,  then, 
who  is  good  and  who  desires  all  things  to  resem- 

» (Ueberweg,  Hist,  of  Phil.,  Vol.  I.,  §  28.) 
^  (The  Timaeus,  Chap,  x.,  p.  333,  Bohn's  Ed.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  201 

ble  Himself,  is  the  measure  of  all  things,  and  jus- 
tice, by  which  Plato  does  not  mean  simply  the 
virtue  of  rendering  to  all  their  dues,  but  which 
with  him  stands  for  the  harmonious  development 
of  the  soul,  consists  in  the  fulfilment  by  man  of 
his  proper  functions  in  relation  to  God,  and  in 
his  efforts  to  resemble  his  Maker.  This  theory 
of  Plato  was  a  beautiful  theory  and  one  that  we 
recognize  to-day  as  Christian  in  character.  But 
how  was  man  to  know  the  Idea  of  ideas  and  to 
perceive  His  thought  ?  He  could  not  climb  up 
to  the  place  of  God  and  see  the  world  and  hu- 
man affairs  from  His  point  of  view.  This  diffi- 
culty Aristotle,  the  great  disciple  of  Plato,  sought 
to  avoid  by  looking  at  man  as  he  ought  to  be,  as 
a  perfect  citizen  in  a  perfect  state. 

Man,  avers  the  Stagirite,  has  need  of  man  for 
his  own  development  and  for  the  attainment  of 
the  real  ends  of  life.  Only  in  a  state  is  the 
ethical  problem  capable  of  solution.  Man  is  by 
nature  a  political  animal  and  must  live  in  an  or- 
ganized society,  for  "  in  the  order  of  Nature  the 
State  is  prior  to  the  household  or  the  individual."  ^ 
The  state  arose  originally  for  the  protection  of 
life,  but  it  ought  to  exist  for  the  attainment  of 
the  supreme  good,  as  it  is  the  supreme  association 
and  embraces  all  the  other  associations  of  life. 
The  supreme  good  which  is  first  obtained  in  a 
'  (Politics,  Book  I.,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  6,  Welldon's  Trans.) 


202  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

state  is  independence,  and  independence  can  be 
had  only  where  law  and  justice  are  observed  and 
practiced.  "  Just  action,"  he  says,  "  is  bound  up 
with  the  existence  of  a  State ;  for  the  adminis- 
tration of  justice  is  an  ordinance  of  the  political 
association  and  the  administration  of  justice  is 
nothing  else  than  the  decision  of  what  is  just."  ^ 
Again,  as  necessarily  follows  from  such  ideas, 
Aristotle  declared  that  justice  is  "  the  supreme 
virtue,  'more  glorious  than  the  star  of  eve  or 
dawn ' ;  or  as  the  proverb  runs, 

*  Justice  is  the  summary  of  all  Virtue.'  "  "^ 

And  justice,  we  have  seen,  he  defined  to  be  the 
"  complete  virtue,"  but  complete  only  "  in  rela- 
tion to  one's  neighbors."^  We  see  then,  when 
we  come  to  ask  what  is  the  test  or  criterion  of 
conduct  in  the  philosophy  of  Aristotle,  t?iat  it  is 
the  just,  or  as  w^e  may  say,  the  perfect  man. 
But  where  was  such  an  one  to  be  found  ?  Surely 
not  in  the  city-states  of  Greece,  nor  yet  in  the 
great  republic  or  empire  of  Kome,  although  in 
both  Grecian  and  Eoman  history  we  find  many 
examples  of  lofty,  though  faulty,  character  dis- 
played, as  Plutarch  has  shown  us  in  his  "  Parallel 
Lives "  of  illustrious  Greeks  and  Eomans ;  but 

» (/c?.,  p.  7.)  2  (Ethics,  Book  V.,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  137.) 

'{Id.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE,  203 

not  in  vain  did  Yirgil,  on  the  eve  of  a  revelation 
of  a  better  life,  proclaim : 

*'  The  latest  era  of  Cumaean  song 
Hath  now  arrived  ;  afresh  the  mighty  round 
Of  ages  is  begun.     And  now  returns  the  virgin, 
Returns  the  dynasty  of  Saturn,     Now 
A  new  succession  is  from  heaven  on  high 
Let  fall."' 

Isaiah,  in  the  loftiest  strains  of  prophecy,  had 
years  before  foretold  the  advent  of  such  a  one. 
"  There  shall  come  forth  a  shoot  out  of  the  stock 
of  Jesse,  and  a  branch  out  of  his  roots  shall  bear 
fruit ;  and  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  shall  rest  upon 
him,  the  spirit  of  wisdom  and  understanding,  the 
spirit  of  counsel  and  might,  the  spirit  of  knowl- 
edge, and  of  the  fear  of  the  Lord ;  and  his  delight 
shall  be  in  the  fear  of  the  Lord ;  and  He  shall 
not  judge  after  the  sight  of  His  eyes,  neither  re- 
prove after  the  hearing  of  His  ears ;  but  with 
righteousness  shall  He  judge  the  poor,  and  re- 
prove with  equity  for  the  meek  of  the  earth."  ^ 
And  so  in  the  era  of  Augustus,  there  was  born 
of  the  Virgin  Mary,  espoused  to  Joseph,  of  the 
lineage  of  Jesse,  Jesus,  the  Christ,  the  Saviour  of 
men. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  the  virgin-birth  of 
the  son  of  God  and  of  Man  is  not  the  question 

'  (Eclogue  iv.,  Pollio.)  ^  (Isaiah  xi.  1-4,  E.  V.) 


204  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

here :  we  are  not  concerned  in  any  way  with  the 
doctrine  of  the  Incarnation,  but  this  all  men 
must  admit,  that  Jesus  Christ  was  and  is  the 
greatest  teacher  of  morality  that  the  world  has 
ever  known,  and  that  He  offered  and  offers  still 
in  Himself  the  best  and  safest  test  and  criterion 
of  what  is  just  and  right ;  that  He  is,  therefore, 
the  highest  and  the  perfect  man,  the  measure  of 
all  things  human.  When  we  look  for  an  exposi- 
tion of  the  teachings  of  Christ  in  the  gospels,  we 
must  say  that  we  can  ignore  none  of  His  words 
and  but  few  of  His  actions  ;  and  yet  we  quickly 
see  that  the  sermon  called  the  "  Sermon  on  the 
Mount "  is  the  first  and  greatest  revelation  of  His 
doctrine,  and  we  will  therefore  confine  our  atten- 
tion now  to  it.  What  is  it  that  distinguishes  this 
sermon  from  every  other  discourse  that  we  have 
of  men  ?  (1)  The  authoritative  way  in  which  it 
is  expressed,  so  different  from  the  tentative  meth- 
ods of  the  scribes  of  Israel  and  the  philosophers 
of  Greece;  (2)  the  constant  dwelling  upon  the 
spirit  of  the  law  rather  than  upon  its  letter ;  (3) 
the  accommodation  of  the  individual  to  the  social 
life  of  man.  In  the  beginning,  the  blessedness  of 
certain  personal  characteristics  is  published,  and 
then,  after  the  proclamation  that  the  possession 
of  such  characteristics  are  the  light  and  salt  of 
the  earth,  and  the  announcement  that  the  law  of 
Moses  and  the  teachings  of  the  prophets  must  be 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  205 

fulfilled,  comes  an  exposition  of  how  they  are  to 
be  carried  into  effect  in  their  widest  and  truest 
significance.  The  inference  is  that  only  those 
who  have  the  qualities  pronounced  to  be  blessed 
can  fulfil  the  law  and  the  teachings  of  the  proph- 
ets, can  be  just  and  upright  in  their  dealings  with 
their  fellow-men,  and  are  therefore  fit  for  the 
highest  social  life  and  the  kingdom  of  God. 
These  only  can  organize  society  as  it  should  be 
organized,  can  make  the  noblest  state.  ^ 

It  is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  since  the  time 
when  this  sermon  was  first  preached,  even  to  this 
present  day,  there  is  not  a  man,  who  has  heard 
it,  who  has  not  been  influenced  by  its  precepts  in 
his  conduct  in  some  degree ;  and  that  every  law 
that  has  arisen  in  Christian  society  in  any  way, 
by  usage  or  custom,  by  judgment  of  prince  or 
court,  by  act  of  synod  or  of  legislature,  has  had 
some  reference  to  it  and  its  great  Preacher. 
Since  Christ  came,  men  have  consciously  or  un- 
consciously had  a  conception  of  what  the  perfect 
man  should  be  in  a  perfect  society,  and  they  have 
therefore  striven  to  carry  out  His  teaching  and 
to  make  His  ideal  of  right  prevail  therein — not 
always,  of  course,  but  always  when  they  have  fol- 
lowed their  noblest  aspirations.  And  so  when 
men  ask  for  the  true  test  and  criterion  of  conduct 
of  men  in  society,  we  must  answer  in  the  words 

'  (St.  Matthew,  Chap,  v.,  et  seq.) 


206  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

of  Jesus  Christ's  greatest  disciple,  St.  Paul,  "  We 
have  the  mind  of  Christ."  ^ 

And  yet  some  men,  when  they  see  how  little 
direct  effect  the  teaching  of  Christ  had  upon  the 
development  of  the  Koman  law,  say  the  world 
could  have  gotten  on  and  perhaps  would  have 
gotten  on  better  without  His  teaching.  Let  us 
see.  But  first  let  us  note  what  was  the  effect  of 
Christianity  upon  the  law  of  Eome.  Koman 
law,  we  have  seen,  reached  its  highest  state  of 
perfection  in  the  era  of  the  Antonine  emperors, 
and  that  era  was  over  a  hundred  years  before 
the  accession  of  Constantine.  When,  after  the 
empire  had  become  Christian,  the  emperors 
sought  to  simplify  the  body  of  the  law  by  their 
edicts  and  decrees,  so  vast  and  unwieldy  had  it 
become,  it  was  a  difficult  thing  to  make  an  im- 
pression upon  it.  "  When  Justinian  ascended  the 
throne,  the  reformation  of  the  Roman  jurispru- 
dence was  an  arduous  but  indispensable  task.  In 
the  space  of  ten  centuries,  the  infinite  variety  of 
laws  and  legal  opinions  had  filled  many  thousand 
volumes,  which  no  fortune  could  purchase,  and 
no  capacity  digest.  Books  could  not  easily  be 
found ;  and  the  judges,  poor  in  the  midst  of 
riches,  Avere  reduced  to  the  exercise  of  their  illit- 
erate discretion."^     Besides  we  must  not  look  to 

1  (1  Corinth,  ii.  16,  R.  v.) 

2  (Gibbon,  Vol.  VIII.,  Chap,  xliv.,  p.  33.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  207 

Christianity  for  direct  rules  of  laAv.  Christ  did 
not  undertake  to  lay  down  new  principles,  but  to 
give  old  ones  a  new  and  spiritual  significance. 
It  was  with  Christianity  as  it  was  with  Stoicism. 
Says  Sir  Henry  Maine,  spealiing  of  the  influence 
of  this  philosophy  on  Koman  law,  "  It  is  a  se- 
rious, though  a  very  common,  error  to  measure 
the  influence  of  Stoicism  on  Eoman  law  by 
counting  up  the  number  of  legal  rules  which  can 
be  confidently  affiliated  on  Stoical  dogmas.  It 
has  often  been  observed  that  the  strength  of 
Stoicism  resided  not  in  its  canons  of  conduct, 
which  were  often  repulsive  and  ridiculous,  but  in 
the  great  though  vague  principle  which  it  incul- 
cated of  resistance  to  passion."  ^  And  there  is 
another  thing  which  we  must  take  into  consid- 
eration when  we  try  to  measure  the  influence 
that  the  teaching  of  Christ  had  upon  the  devel- 
opment of  the  civil  law,  and  that  is  that  Jesus 
Christ,  when  brought  before  Pontius  Pilate,  rec- 
ognized both  by  his  words  and  by  his  de- 
meanor that  the  law  that  Pontius  Pilate  was  set 
to  administer  had  in  it  the  element  of  justice. 
And  why  not  ?  AYhy  should  we  take  a  narrow 
view  of  life,  and  of  life's  history,  and  believe  that 
justice  was  simply  revealed  to  the  Jews,  and  that 
they  alone  knew  the  principles  of  morality? 
"The  invisible  things  of  Him,"  says  St.  Paul, 

'  (Ancient  Law,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  53.) 


208  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

"  since  the  creation  of  the  world  are  clearly  seen, 
being  perceived  through  the  things  that  are 
made,  even  His  everlasting  power  and  divinity."  ^ 
And  TertuUian,  one  of  the  first  of  the  great 
Latin  Fathers,  a  scholar  learned  in  the  law  of 
Eome,  wrote :  "  Why  should  God,  the  Founder 
of  the  universe,  the  Governor  of  the  whole 
world,  the  Fashioner  of  humanity,  the  Sower  of 
universal  nations,  be  believed  to  have  given  a 
law  through  Moses  to  one  people,  and  not  be  said 
to  have  assigned  it  to  all  nations  ?  For  unless 
He  had  given  it  to  all  by  no  means  would  He 
have  habitually  permitted  even  proselytes  out  of 
the  nations  to  have  access  to  it.  But — as  is  con- 
gruous with  the  goodness  of  God,  and  with  His 
equity  as  the  Fashioner  of  mankind — He  gave  to 
all  nations  the  self-same  law,  which  at  definite 
and  stated  times  He  enjoined  should  be  observed, 
when  He  willed,  and  through  whom  He  willed, 
and  as  He  willed."^ 

But  why  multiply  authorities  ?  It  is  self-evi- 
dent that  as  God  made  of  '^  one  every  nation  of 
men  for  to  dwell  on  all  the  face  of  the  earth," 
He  gave  them  all  the  same  laws  of  right  con- 
duct; though  to  the  Hebrews  were  the  two 
tables  of  the  Law  especially  given,  or  added,  be- 

>  (Eomansi.  20,  E.  V.) 

'  (The  Ante-Nicene  Fathers,  TertuUian,  "An  Answer  to  the 
Jews,"  Chap,  ii.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE,  209 

cause  of  offences.  It  was  these  same  laws  of 
right  conduct  (as  they  had  been  declared  by 
Moses)  that  Christ  expounded  on  the  mount.  In 
those  principles  wherein  the  Koman  law  was 
just  (and  there  were  many  of  them)  it  would  nec- 
essarily stand;  in  those  commands  wherein  it 
was  unjust,  it  would  necessarily  have  to  be  modi- 
fied or  done  away.  The  jurisprudence  of  the  old 
Eoman  Empire  admitted  at  first  only  in  a  limited 
degree  this  modifying  power,  but  gradually,  as 
larger  numbers  of  the  subjects  of  the  Empire  be- 
came adherents  of  Christ,  it  had,  per  force,  to 
take  Christ's  teaching  more  and  more  into  con- 
sideration, both  as  creating  a  necessity  for  new 
laws  conforming  to  the  changed  order  of  things, 
and  also  because,  the  minds  of  many  of  the  legis- 
lators becoming  dominated  by  Christian  ideals,  it 
could  not  help  but  do  so. 

Justinian  sought  to  consolidate  in  his  eternal 
legislation  all  the  ancient  and  modern  laws  and 
customs  of  the  realm.  "  But  the  change  which 
had  come  over  the  Koman  empire  is  manifest  at 
once.  That  Justinian  is  a  Christian  Emperor 
appears  in  the  front  of  his  jurisprudence.  Before 
the  august  temple  of  the  Eoman  law  there  is,  as 
it  were,  a  vestibule  in  which  the  Emperor  seats 
himself  as  the  religious  legislator  of  the  world  in 
its  new  relation  toward  God."  ^  And  so,  what  we 
>  (Milman,  Lat.  Chris.  Vol.  I.,  Book  III.,  Chap,  v.,  p.  485.) 


210  THE  STATE  AND   TEE  CHURCH. 

ought  to  look  for  and  at  is  the  influence  of  the 
teaching  of  Christ,  or  as  we  may  say,  of  Chris- 
tianity, upon  the  Koman  world  and  the  world  of 
the  barbaric  nations  that  followed  that  of  Kome. 
We  have  seen  in  a  former  lecture  that  there 
were  four  great  things  or  elements  that,  coming 
together,  made  the  modern  state,  and  that  they 
were,  the  philosophy  of  Greece,  the  law  of  Eome, 
the  Germans,  and  Christianity.  We  are  now  to 
study  the  eifect  of  Christianity  upon  the  civiliza- 
tion of  the  world.  I  have  touched  upon  it  so 
often  that  it  will  not  be  necessary  to  go  into  de- 
tails. I  desire  simply  to  point  out  now  some 
heretofore  unnoticed  things.  "  The  new  force 
which  was  born  into  the  world  with  the  Chris- 
tian religion  was  evidently,  from  the  very  first, 
of  immeasurable  social  significance."  ^  The  orig- 
inal impulse  appeared  to  be  weak,  but  it  was  in 
fact  tremendous.  Who  would  ever  have  sup- 
posed that  the  preaching  of  a  few  illiterate  fish- 
ermen and  of  an  apparently  "  mad "  Pharisee, 
would  have  completely  changed  the  hearts  of 
men  and  the  trend  of  civilization  ?  Who  would 
ever  have  believed  that  it  would  have  under- 
mined and  destroyed  the  most  powerful  and 
most  carefully  organized  society  that  mankind 
had  up  to  that  time,  perhaps  ever,  evolved  ? 
Who  would    ever  have  believed  that  it  would 

1  (Kidd,  "Social  Evolution,"  Chap,  vi.,  p.  123.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  211 

have  built  up  in  men's  hearts  and  minds  the  ideal 
of  a  newer  and  nobler  order  of  social  life  ?  And 
yet  it  did  all  these  things.  Christianity  not  only 
destroyed,  but  it  constructed,  and  it  is  this  that 
gives  it  its  greatest  claim  upon  humanity.  Apart, 
of  course,  from  its  revelation  of  the  Godhead  in 
relation  to  man,  the  constructive  principle  of  the 
Christian  life  was  of  primary  and  chief  impor- 
tance. Men  were  transformed.  The  old  motives 
and  ideas  which  had  moved  them,  moved  them 
now  no  more.  In  the  place  of  the  fact  of  citizen- 
ship, there  came  the  ideal  of  brotherhood.  In 
the  place  of  faith  in  the  eternity  of  Eome,  there 
came  a  belief  in  the  eternal  fatherhood  of  God. 
In  the  place  of  indifference  to  decency  and  mo- 
rality, there  came  a  frenzy  to  be  pure  and  clean. 
In  the  place  of  a  neglect  of  the  claims  of  human- 
ity, there  came  a  love  for  mankind  that  touched 
the  stars.  "  There  has  probably  never  existed 
upon  earth  a  community  whose  members  were 
bound  to  one  another  by  a  deeper  or  purer  affec- 
tion than  the  Christians,  in  the  days  of  the  per- 
secution." ^ 

It  is  not  necessary  to  inquire  just  why  these 
things  came  to  pass,  but  apart  from  the  divine 
order  we  can  see  that,  before  the  teaching  of 
Christ  was  made  known  to  men,  the  old  religion 
and  the  ethical  system  or  systems  upon  which 

'  (Lecky,  Hist,  of  European  Morals,  Vol.  I.,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  424. ) 


212  THE  STATE  AND  THE  CHURCH. 

the  dominion  of  Eome  had  been  built  had  begun 
to  decay,  and  men  were  longing  for  something 
better.  "Keligion,  once  the  foundation  of  the 
laws  and  rule  of  personal  conduct,  had  subsided 
into  opinion.  The  educated,  in  their  hearts,  dis- 
believed it.  Temples  were  still  built  with  in- 
creasing splendor ;  the  established  forms  were 
scrupulously  observed.  Public  men  spoke  con- 
ventionally of  Providence,  that  they  might  throw 
on  their  opponents  the  odium  of  impiety ;  but  of 
genuine  belief  that  life  had  any  serious  meaning, 
there  was  none  remaining  beyond  the  circle  of 
the  silent,  patient,  ignorant  multitude."  ^  A  few 
short  years  after  the  empire  had  been  established 
a  Nero  could  command  that  the  worthiest  citizen 
should  take  his  own  life,  and  the  despot's  desire 
formed  the  command  to  do  so.  Later  on,  a 
Commodus  could  drag  the  majesty  of  the  purple 
through  the  blood  and  mud  of  the  arena,  and 
yet  he  could  compel  the  senate  to  decree  that  he 
was  the  Eoman  Hercules.  And  still  later;  a 
Heliogabalus  could  bring  with  him  the  effemi- 
nate dress  of  an  Oriental  priest  of  the  sun  to  the 
throne,  and  make  the  Komans  to  submit  to  his 
wild  and  wanton  manners.  And  all  these,  and 
thousands  of  men,  their  minions  and  followers, 
and  thousands,  the  minions  and  followers  of 
other  emperors  and  rulers,  indulged  in  excesses 

'  (Froude,  Caesar,  Chap,  i.,  p.  7.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  213 

and  orgies  so  horrid  and  vile  that  they  cannot 
be  named  in  our  honest  English,  but  must  be 
left  untranslated  in  the  Latin  tongue. 

But,  as  we  have  said,  the  preaching  of  Christ 
changed  all  these  things.  What  was  it  in  His 
teaching  that  gave  hope  to  a  despairing  world, 
and  animated  the  effete  society  with  new  motives 
and  ideas  ?  Principally  the  facts,  and  the  belief 
in  the  facts,  of  the  Fatherhood  of  God,  the  Son- 
ship  of  Christ  and  the  brotherhood  of  all  men  as 
sons  of  God  and  brothers  of  Christ.  In  spite  of 
the  best  thought  of  the  best  philosophers,  that 
God  was  one  and  indivisible,  it  needed  a  divine 
revelation  to  convince  mankind  that  their  "  gods 
many  and  lords  many  "  were  ridiculous,  and  that 
their  worship,  running  off,  as  it  did,  into  all  sorts 
of  debauchery,  was  debasing  to  the  soul,  and  sub- 
versive of  the  foundations  of  society  and  the 
state.  And  yet  this  revelation  would  not  in  all 
probability  have  destroyed  the  polytheism  of  the 
classical  nations,  unless  with  the  revelation  there 
had  been  vouchsafed  to  mankind  the  assurance 
that  God  was,  and  is,  the  Father  of  all  men,  and 
that  Jesus  Christ,  His  only-begotten  Son,  is  our 
brother.  And  in  the  fatherhood  of  God  and  the 
brotherhood  of  Christ  men  went  back  (as  they 
must  ever  do)  to  the  idea  of  a  family  ;  only  the 
natural  family  was  no  longer  the  ideal  of  society, 
but  the  universal  family  of  mankind.     It  is,  as  I 


214  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

take  it,  out  of  the  conception  of  tlie  universal 
family  of  mankind  that  has  come  all  the  best 
and  noblest  things  of  our  western  civilization, 
and  it  is  this  conception  that  is  the  impulse  of 
all  our  efforts  for  the  attainment  of  justice  among 
men.  It  has  taken  a  long  while  for  the  ideal  to 
develop,  indeed,  it  has  not  by  any  means  devel- 
oped fully  even  now,  yet  when  we  read  history 
closely  we  can  see  that  Christ's  teaching  is  grad- 
ually becoming  better  understood.  The  ideal  ex- 
pands, and  with  the  expansion  of  the  ideal  grow 
our  beneficent  laws  and  our  softer  and  gentler 
ways  of  living.  "When  we  think  of  an  universal 
famil}^,  it  is  not  necessary  to  think  of  an  univer- 
sal empire,  and  it  is  here  that  Bluntschli  made 
his  greatest  mistake.  Bluntschli  looked  at  man 
as  an  individual  and  mankind  as  a  whole,  and 
declared  that  they  are  "  the  original  and  perma- 
nent antithesis  of  creation."  ^  We  must  not  look 
at  man  as  an  individual,  but  at  man  as  grouped 
in  families.  And  so  we  need  not  look  at  an  uni- 
versal state,  but  at  a  family  of  states.  The 
glory  of  the  universe  is  diversity  in  unity.  The 
idea  of  the  universal  state  has  departed  with  the 
idea  of  the  universal  church  ;  neither  the  one  nor 
the  other  will  rise  again  on  earth.  The  king- 
doms of  the  world  will  become  the  kingdom  of 
Christ,  and  the  churches  will  become  the  church 

1  (The  Theory  of  the  State,  Book  I.,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  26.) 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  215 

of  Christ,  like  as  the  Anglican  and  the  American 
churches  are  one  and  yet  not  one — one  as  are 
the  members  of  a  family. 

The  question  forces  itself  at  once  upon  our 
minds,  Avhat  is  the  bond  of  the  family,  and  what 
is  its  controlling  power  ?  And  the  answer  comes 
at  once,  love.  It  is  futile  to  go  back  into  an 
imaginary  past  and  declare  that  love  originated 
in  the  care  of  a  mother  for  her  offspring,  and 
then  passed  over  to  the  father.  Man  is  only  man 
as  he  manifests  this  divine  quality  in  every  mem- 
ber of  the  race ;  and  yet  we  must  observe  that  it 
was  Christ  who  made  man  more  of  a  man  than 
he  ever  was  before.  It  was  love  that  became  the 
great  religious  force  of  the  new  era  of  Chris- 
tianity. In  the  practical  workings  of  Chris- 
tianity, this  great  thing  was  not  confined  to  the 
family  ;  nor  did  it  remain  a  mere  idea  in  society. 
As  it  burned  in  the  hearts  of  all  the  followers  of 
Christ  it  became  a  force  that  transformed  all 
their  ideas  of,  and  all  their  actions  in,  life.  And 
it  was  love  that  made  them  just ;  men  cannot  be 
unjust  to  those  they  love,  and  thus  the  ideal  of 
justice  in  law  became  modified. 

We  must  admit,  when  we  read  the  history  of 
the  peoples  of  Europe  in  the  times  subsequent  to 
Charlemagne  until  our  own  era,  that  the  ideals  of 
the  brotherhood  of  man  and  of  brotherly  love 
fell  greatly  in  abeyance ;  but  this  is  precisely 


216  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

why  we  call  these  ages  the  ''  dark  ages " ;  and 
yet  we  find  even  in  those  times  many  evidences 
of  love  in  the  works  of  Christian  brotherhoods  of 
St.  Francis  and  of  other  of  the  saints  of  the 
church,  and  in  the  high  principles  of  chivalry. 
But  it  is  certainly  not  until  the  old  ideas  of  an 
universal  Koman  empire  and  of  an  universal 
Roman  church  had  received  their  deathblows  at 
the  reformation  of  the  church  and  the  reorgani- 
zation of  society  in  the  breaking  up  of  feudalism, 
that  the  great  conception  of  the  universal  family 
of  man  in  the  universal  fatherhood  of  God  grew 
strong  and  expanded.  Feudalism  had  so  many 
various  causes,  and  presents  so  many  variable 
aspects,  it  is  impossible  to  describe  it  here.  It 
grew  undoubtedly,  as  we  have  seen,  out  of  a 
movement  in  retrogression  from  the  government 
and  civilization  of  Charlemagne,  and  was  founded 
primarily  upon  the  fief,  an  estate  held  by  an  in- 
ferior of  a  superior,  on  condition  of  military  or 
other  service.  The  fief  was  a  fragment  of  the 
Frankish  empire.  It  arose,  as  all  human  institu- 
tions do,  out  of  necessity,  as  the  only  means  that 
could  be  devised  of  keeping  the  fierce,  warlike, 
self-assertive  society  of  the  barbarous  peoples  in 
medieeval  Europe  together.  We  are  concerned 
here  with  but  one  aspect  of  feudalism.  Its  hier- 
archical gradations  of  sovereigns,  and  vassals,  and 
freemen,  and  villains,  and  serfs,  stood  in  the  way 


THE  LAW  OF  THE  STATE.  217 

of  the  natural  expansion  of  the  ideal  of  Christian 
brotherhood,  and  thus  of  the  development  of 
our  western  civilization.  It  was  not  until  the 
abolition  of  feudal  tenures  in  England  by  Parlia- 
ment in  1660,  and  the  breaking  up  of  the  same  in 
France  by  the  people  in  1793,  that  men  began  to 
understand  that  rank  and  order  are  formal  things, 
and  that  no  rank  and  no  order  can  neutralize  the 
great  fact  of  the  brotherhood  of  man.  At  first 
the  idea  of  brotherhood  grew  only  within  the 
different  states,  developing  a  force  that  put  down 
factions  and  factious  wars ;  but  now  it  is  grow- 
ing among  the  nations  themselves,  making  it  ever 
more  and  more  difficult  for  any  state  to  oppress 
and  harass  another  in  the  family  of  Christian  na- 
tions. 

But  the  idea  of  brotherly  love  has  not  stopped 
within  the  state  with  the  putting  down  of  in- 
ternecine wars ;  it  has  gone  on  working  ever 
more  and  more,  softening  the  manners  of  all 
sorts  of  men,  and  ameliorating  the  conditions  of 
life  of  those  who  in  darker  ages  were  compelled 
to  bear  all  the  burdens  of  society  and  govern- 
ment. And  this  divine  force  law  has  been  com- 
pelled to  recognize  in  every  way.  It  is  this  that 
has  changed  the  whole  conception  of  criminal 
law  and  of  punishment  for  its  infraction.  It  is 
this  that  has  placed  many  acts  for  the  protection 
of  "  working  "  men  and  women  and  children  on 


218  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  statute  books ;  it  is  this  that  has  secured  for 
all  classes  a  minimum  of  education ;  it  is  this  that 
has  made  municipal  corporations  to  care  for  the 
housing  of  the  poor;  it  is  this  that  is  making 
common  carriers,  and  other  quasi-public  corpora- 
tions, recognize  the  fact  that  they  exist  primarily 
for  the  benefit  of  the  people,  and  that  they  must 
conduct  their  businesses  in  justice  with  regard  to 
all.  Justice  to-day  in  Great  Britain  and  in  the 
United  States  is  commensurate  with  the  ideal  of 
brotherly  love  of  these  two  peoples,  and  law  is 
gradually  becoming  the  expression  of  that  love. 
And  what  is  this  but  to  say  that  all  the  law  and 
all  the  teaching  of  men  is  summed  up  in  the  love 
of  God  and  of  man,  even  as  Christ  said :  For  he 
who  loves  God,  the  father  of  all,  will  understand 
justice,  and  he  who  loves  his  fellow-men,  his 
brothers  of  the  universal  family  named  of  Christ, 
will  deal  justly  with  them,  and  the  rules  of  con- 
duct which  such  men  form  will  be  based  on  love. 


LECTUKE  YI. 

THE   PEOPLE. 


0 


^We  have  seen  in  a  former  lecture  that  one  of 
the  great  distinctions  between  the  modern  and 
the  ancient  state  is  that,  whereas  in  ancient  times 
the  state  was  all  important,  and  the  citizens  ex- 
isted primarily  for  its  benefit,  to-day  the  point 
of  view,  or  of  departure  in  state  law  and  politics, 
has  changed.  It  is  now  the  citizen  that  is  of 
chief  importance  and  the  state  exists  exclusively 
for  his  benefit.  The  principal  object  of  the 
study  of  law  and  politics  should  therefore  be  the 
citizen,  or  as  we  may  say,  the  masses  of  citizens, 
the  people.  Who,  and  what  are  the  people? 
"  Peoples  and  Nations,"  says  Bluntschli,  "  are  the 
products  of  history.  A  People  comes  into  being 
by  a  slow  psychological  process,  in  which  a  mass 
of  men  gradually  develop  a  type  of  life  and  so- 
ciety which  differentiates  them  from  others,  and 
becomes  the  fixed  inheritance  of  their  race."  j 

"  A  mere  arbitrary  combination  or  collection 
of  men  has  never  given  rise  to  a  People.  Even 
the  voluntary  agreement  and  social  contract  of  a 
number  of  persons  cannot  create  one.     To  form 

219 


220  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

a  People  the  experiences  and  fortunes  of  several 
generations  must  cooperate,  and  its  permanence 
is  never  secured  until  a  succession  of  families, 
handing  down  its  accumulated  culture  from  gen- 
eration to  generation,  has  made  its  characteris- 
tics hereditary."  ^  We  see,  then,  that  the  two 
chief  marks  or  notes  of  a  people  are  race  and 
family  ;  a  people  must  possess  certain  character- 
istics which  make  it  different  in  race  from  other 
peoples,  and  these  characteristics  are  preserved 
and  transmitted  from  generation  to  generation 
in  the  family.  It  is  scarcely  necessary  for  me  to 
define  the  term  "  nation."  We  know  that  "  na- 
tion "  suggests  to  us  a  political  idea  rather  than 
a  social ;  and  so  w^e  may  say  in  a  general  way  a 
nation  is  a  people  organized  into  a  state. 

We  perceive,  w^hen  we  look  back  over  the 
broad  fields  of  history,  that  race  has  been  the 
dominant  factor  in  the  birth  and  growth  of  the 
state  from  time  immemorial,  and  that  it  has  for  the 
most  part  conditioned  its  progress  and  determined 
its  bounds.  It  is  not  my  purpose  to  study  with 
you  all  the  races,  or  even  all  the  peoples  of  any 
race — we  have  not  time  to  do  so.  We  have  in- 
cidentally studied  one  people  of  the  Semitic  and 
three  of  the  Aryan  race,  both  of  which  great 
families  of  men  belong  to  the  division  of  the 
white  race,  ^'  the  children  of  the  sun  and  heaven," 
'  (The  Theory  of  the  State,  Book  II.,  Chap,  ii.,  p.  87.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  221 

as  the  ancients  called  them.  All  the  higher  re- 
ligions which  unite  man  to  God  were  first  re- 
vealed among  them ;  all  the  philosophy,  the 
whole  body  of  the  law,  and  the  perfection  of  art, 
issued  from  the  workings  of  their  mind.  In  con- 
tact with  other  races  they  have  always  ended  in 
subduing  them.  They  have  dominated,  and,  in- 
deed, they  yet  dominate  the  world.  The  func- 
tion of  the  Semitic  race  is  a  religious  one ;  on 
the  other  hand,  the  Aryan  race  has  done  most 
for  the  development  of  the  state  and  the  estab- 
lishing and  maintenance  of  the  rights  of  men. 
Each  of  these  two  great  races  of  the  human 
family  is  divided  into  several  minor  races,  and 
these  minor  races  again  into  many  peoples.  The 
subidivisions  of  the  Semitic  race  we  will  not  re- 
gard, but  only  the  subdivisions  of  the  Aryan, 
and  of  these  we  will  regard  only  three,  the  Latin, 
the  Teuton  and  the  Slav.  The  Anglo-American 
people,  commonly  called  the  Anglo-American 
race,  because  of  its  greatness,  is  a  branch  of  the 
Teutonic  race,  and  we  will  study  it  as  such. 

When  we  look  over  the  field  of  Europe,  the 
home  of  the  chiefest  part  of  the  Aryan  race,  we 
find  these  three  great  subdivisions  confronting 
each  other  and  striving  for  the  mastery.  On  the 
continents  of  America  only  two,  the  Latin  and 
the  Teutonic,  are  to  be  found.^    The  Slav  has  as 

'  (Since  Russia  sold  Alaska  to  the  United  States. ) 


222  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

yet  scarcely  entered  upon  the  battle  for  suprem- 
acy; he  may,  therefore,  be  briefly  dismissed. 
What  the  future  may  have  in  store  for  this  pa- 
tient, plodding,  religious  race  of  men  we  do  not 
kno\Y  ;  but  it  is  evident  that  the  Slav  will  not 
strongly  contend  with  the  rest  of  the  nations  un- 
til the  battle  between  the  Latin  and  the  Teutonic 
races  shall  have  been  brought  to  its  final  termi- 
nation. We  sometimes  think  that  the  "  mills  of 
God  grind  slowl}^,"  and  yet,  when  we  think  so 
we  ought  to  call  to  mind  how  vast  have  been  the 
progress  of  events  and  the  march  of  history. 
Why,  it  is  but  four  hundred  years  since  Pope 
Alexander  YI.  undertook  to  give  the  lands  found 
and  to  be  found  west  of  a  meridian  one  hundred 
leagues  west  of  the  Azores  and  the  Cape  Yerde 
Islands  to  the  kings  of  Castile,  their  heirs  and 
successors  forever;  Pope  Eugenius  lY.  having 
previously  granted  all  the  lands  to  the  east  to 
the  kings  of  Portugal.  It  was  only  three  hun- 
dred years  ago  that  Philip  II.  of  Spain,  the  great- 
est monarch  of  his  age,  sent  his  invincible  Ar- 
mada to  conquer  the  realm  of  England.  It  is 
scarcely  two  hundred  years  ago  when  Louis  XIY. 
of  France  obscured  the  other  potentates  of  his 
day,  and  sought  to  absorb  the  light  of  the  sun. 
It  is  not  a  hundred  years  since  Napoleon  Bonaparte 
trampled  upon  the  persons  and  properties  of  all 
the  kings  who  opposed  his  way,  and  tried  to  set 


THE  PEOPLE.  223 

up  an  universal  empire ;  and  yet,  to-day,  Portu- 
gal is  nothing  more  than  a  commercial  depend- 
ency of  England ;  Spain  is  shorn  of  her  colonies 
and  is  bankrupt ;  her  remaining  dependencies, 
having  revolted  against  her  misrule,  have  been 
taken  from  her  forcibly.  Italy,  which  has  not 
sent  out  a  colony  since  the  days  of  the  Caesars 
until  this  age,  has  been  obliged  to  surrender  al- 
most her  only  foreign  possession.  France  is 
weighed  down  with  debt  and  care ;  the  popula- 
tion of  '•Ha  grande  nation''''  declines  slightly 
every  year.  Though  feverishly  putting  forth 
her  strength  to  colonize  Algeria  and  Tongking 
and  Madagascar  and  other  parts  of  Africa ;  she 
holds  what  she  cannot  use. 

The  Teutonic  race,  on  the  other  hand,  goes  on 
to  greatness  every  year.  This  race,  it  is  evident, 
came  to  absolute  preeminence  when  the  new 
German  empire  was  formed.  During  the  time 
of  the  division  of  Germany  into  many  sovereign 
states,  subjects  for  French  ambition  and  in- 
trigues, there  was  a  question  whether  the  Latin 
or  the  Teutonic  race  would  acquire  "  the  sceptre,'* 
in  spite  of  the  rapid  growth  in  numbers  and 
power  of  the  English  speaking  peoples.  The 
question  probably  would  have  been  decided  in 
favor  of  the  Teutonic  race  even  if  Germany  had 
remained  divided,  because  of  the  progress  of 
Great    Britain   and   her  offspring,   the    United 


224  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

States.  But,  however  it  might  have  been,  it  was 
the  entrance  of  Germany  as  a  united  state  into 
the  family  of  nations  which  decided  the  question 
absolutely  in  favor  of  the  Teutons.  And  yet 
Germany  in  many  ways  is  Latinized.  She  holds 
a  secondary  place  among  the  Teutonic  peoples, 
although  she  possesses  the  home  of  the  greatest 
of  the  Germanic  tribes.  It  is  the  Anglo-Saxons, 
or,  better,  the  Anglo-Americans,  that  are  first  in 
power  and  preeminence  among  the  Teutons,  and 
the  whole  family  of  the  Aryans,  a  race  which  if 
it  sprang  chiefly  from  the  Angles  and  Saxons,  yet 
has  in  it  a  strain  of  the  Northmen  and  something 
of  the  Celts,  and  of  the  other  peoples  of  Europe, 
at  least  in  its  North  American  branch.  But  how 
is  Germany  Latinized  ?  In  her  idea  or  plan  of 
government.  Germany  possesses  under  her  pres- 
ent ruling  dynasty  the  Koman  or  military  type 
of  state,  which  tends  ultimately  to  Ca3sarism ; 
that  is,  to  the  rule  of  an  emperor  founded  upon 
the  obedience  of  all  the  people.  It  is  vain  for 
the  Kaiser  to  try  to  revive  the  institutions,  with 
the  glamour  of  the  middle  ages ;  his  rule  rests 
not  upon  the  old  Stdnde  (Estates)  of  the  Holy 
Eoman  empire ;  (feudalism  was  done  away  with 
by  the  revolution  which  the  French  inaugurated) ; 
it  rests  directly  upon  the  backs  of  a  toiling  peo- 
ple. The  Germanic  empire  is  a  state  in  which 
the  Kaiser  is  the  chief  or  war-lord,  and  between 


THE  PEOPLE.  225 

him  and  the  people  there  is  nothing  but  a  titular 
nobility.  In  Germany  the  people  still  live  pri- 
marily for  the  state.  The  thought  of  the  ancient 
world  perpetuates  itself  where  we  would  least 
have  thought  to  find  it,  and  thus  Germany  is  a 
laggard  in  the  family  of  the  Teutonic  nations ; 
but  Germany  has  always  had  a  strange  longing 
for  the  things  across  the  Alps,  always  a  fatal  ad- 
miration for  the  things  across  the  Khine. 

Among  the  Latin  peoples  we  find,  as  may  be 
expected,  that  the  old  idea  of  the  great  impor- 
tance of  the  state  has  survived.  It  has  been 
somewhat  modified  by  the  rise  and  growth  of  the 
democratic  spirit,  yet  in  monarchical  Spain  and 
Italy,  as  well  as  in  republican  France,  the  state 
is  still  first  in  the  estimation  of  the  people  and 
they  look  to  it  for  rule  and  guidance  in  every 
way  of  life ;  it  is  still  the  great  patron  and  dis- 
penser of  awards  and  honors.  This  may  be  seen 
in  many  things,  but  especially  in  the  education, 
or  lack  of  education,  of  the  Spanish  and  Italian 
and  French  boys ;  in  the  custom  of  the  father 
making  provision  for  the  maintenance  of  each  of 
his  children ;  in  the  eagerness  Avith  which  men 
desire  to  secure  some  place  under  the  govern- 
ment ;  in  the  bureaucratic  methods  of  adminis- 
tration ;  but  chiefly  in  the  lack  of  self-reliance 
that  these  peoples  display. 

"  Ask  a  hundred  young  Frenchmen,  graduating 


226  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

from  college,"  says  Edmond  Demolins,  "for  what 
careers  they  are  destined,  and  three-quarters  of 
them  will  reply  that  they  are  candidates  for  posi- 
tions under  the  government."  And  as  it  is  by 
examinations  that  positions  are  obtained,  it  re- 
sults, "that  to  succeed  at  examination  is  the 
principal  preoccupation  of  the  young  French- 
man, since  all  his  future  depends  upon  his  first 
success."  ^ 

On  the  other  hand,  M.  Demolins  shows  that  the 
prime  object  of  education  in  the  new  conditions 
of  modern  life  should  be  to  make  children  self- 
reliant  and  to  create  in  them  a  power  of  initia- 
tion, and  this  object  he  states  is  accomplished  by 
the  English.  "More  advanced  than  we  are  in 
the  way  of  modern  transformations,  they  feel 
still  more  the  obligation  of  responding  to  their 
great  necessities.  These  are  essentially  to  make 
young  men  ready  a  se  tirer  aux-memes  d"* affaire 
in  all  the  difficulties  and  in  all  the  situations  of 
life  ;  that  is,  to  make  practical  and  energetic 
men,  and  not  functionaries  and  litterateurs,  who 
know  life  only  as  they  learn  it  in  books,  that  is  to 
say,  but  very  little."  ^ 

And  this  ability  and  power  to  rely  upon  one- 
self de   Tocqueville   considers   to    be  the  most 

*  {A  quoi  tient  la  superiorite  des  Anglo-Saxons,  Liv.  I.,  Chap, 
i.,  p.  3.) 

'{Id.,  Chap,  iii.,  p.  54.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  227 

striking  characteristic  of  Americans,  who,  as  we 
know,  have  the  same  origin  as  the  English,  have 
lived  for  centuries  under  the  same  laws,  are  using 
the  same  language,  and  are  constantly  exchang- 
ing opinions  and  ideas,  and  who  thus  acquire  the 
same  methods  and  manners.  After  alluding  to 
the  fact  that  the  Americans  have  no  [political] 
school  of  philosophy  and  care  very  little  for 
those  into  which  Europe  is  divided,  he  says  it  is 
"  nevertheless  easy  to  perceive  that  almost  all  the 
inhabitants  of  the  United  States  conduct  their 
understanding  in  the  same  manner  and  govern  it 
by  the  same  rules,"  and  these  rules  he  declares  to 
be :  "  to  evade  the  bondage  of  system  and  habit, 
of  family-maxims,  class  opinions,  and,  in  some 
degree,  of  national  prejudices ;  to  accept  tradi- 
tion only  as  a  means  of  information,  and  existing 
facts  only  as  a  lesson  used  in  doing  otherwise  and 
doing  better;  to  seek  the  reason  of  things  for 
oneself,  and  in  oneself  alone ;  to  tend  to  results 
without  being  bound  to  means,  and  to  aim  at  the 
substance  through  the  form  ; — such  are  the  princi- 
pal characteristics  of  what  I  shall  call  the  phil- 
osophical method  of  the  Americans."^ 

It  is  precisely  by  reason  and  by  means  of  this 

self-reliance,  or,  as  Demolins  calls  it,  "  self-help," 

that  the  foundations  of  the  English  colonies  were 

laid  so  securely  on  the  bleak  shores  of  the  ]N"orth 

'  (Democracy  in  America,  Part  II.,  Book  I.,  Chap,  i.,  p.  1.) 


228  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

Atlantic,  and  it  was  by  reason  and  by  means  of 
this  very  thing  that  the  colonies  overcame  the 
French  in  the  long  war  for  the  possession  of  the 
North  American  continent ;  and  this  thing  it  was 
that  made  these  young  colonies  a  great  and  mas- 
terful people,  able  to  stand  alone  in  the  family 
of  nations ;  and  this  "  self-help  "  of  the  colonies 
it  was  too  that  taught  the  mother  countrj^  a 
lesson,  both  how  to  deal  with  her  other  children 
abroad  and  how  to  further  their  interests  at 
home.  It  is  self-reliance,  "  self-help,"  that  makes 
the  men  of  the  Anglo-American  race  not  to  wait 
upon  the  state,  but  rather  to  act  for  themselves. 
And  this  gives  them  the  effective  power  of  initia- 
tion that  has  made  them  to  seek  for  new  routes 
and  new  possessions  everywhere  throughout  the 
wide  world.  And  this  leads  us  to  the  conclusion 
that  not  all  the  people  of  the  Aryan  race  can  be 
said  to  possess  the  ideal  of  the  state  which  we 
call  modern,  but  only  those  of  the  Teutonic  sub- 
division, and  of  this  subdivision  Germany,  though 
she  has  the  ideal  of  the  modern  state  in  her  phi- 
losophy, yet  has  she  the  ideal  rather  than  its 
substance.  "We  will  therefore  study  principall}^ 
the  Anglo-American  peoples,  and  of  them  that 
which  we  know  best,  the  American. 

Let  us  ask  ourselves,  then,  what  is  our  attitude 
toward  the  state  ?  Is  it  that  of  a  subject  ?  Xo  ; 
we  never  speak  of  ourselves  as  such.     Is  it  that 


THE  PEOPLE.  229 

of  a  client?  No;  we  do  not  depend  upon  the 
state  for  life  and  liberty.  Is  it  that  of  a  master  ? 
No ;  we  do  not  dominate  our  fellow-citizens  by 
means  of  government.  (^The  attitude  of  Ameri- 
cans toward  the  state  is  that  of  a  part  owner, 
the  part  being  infinitesimal  because  of  the  mul- 
titude of  owners,  but  none  the  less  real  though 
it  be  small.  And  it  is  this  ownership  that  makes 
us  to  delight  in  the  state,  that  makes  us  to  de- 
termine that  nothing  that  is  harmful  shall  come 
to  it.  And  this  makes  us  to  understand  also  that 
the  state  exists  for  us,  and  not  we  for  the  state. 
As  wonderful  as  we  believe  the  constitution  of 
the  United  States  to  be,  yet  we  know  and  feel 
that  it  was  and  is  a  creation  of  man  and  was 
made  by  man  for  his  good,  because  man  cannot 
live  in  a  stateless  condition.  It  is  because  its 
work  has  been  so  beneficent  that  it  is  so  much 
admired  and  revered ;  and  yet,  silently  and  un- 
obtrusively, we  have  changed  much  of  its  spirit 
where  we  have  not  altered  a  letter.  J  We  well 
understand  that  the  men  who  made  the  consti- 
tution, though  they  were  democratic  in  many 
things,  were  yet  in  others  aristocratic,  and  this 
is  seen  particularly  in  the  status  of  the  supreme 
court  and  in  the  machinery  for  the  election  of 
the  president.  And  again  we  see  this  in  the  fact 
that  Washington  and  Lee,  Livingston  and  Ham- 
ilton, Otis  and  Hancock,  and  the  chief  actors  in 


230  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  great  drama  for  liberty  generally  were  aris- 
tocrats, if  not  by  birth,  by  education  and  feeling. 
It  is  to  be  remarked  that  Lafayette  and  Rocham- 
beau  were  ever  in  sympathy  with  the  oiRcers  of 
our  revolution,  and  that  they  were  not  so  with 
those  who  subsequently  made  the  French.  It 
was  not  until  the  presidency  of  Jefferson  that 
democracy  became  a  real  factor  in  the  govern- 
ment of  the  United  States.  And  it  was  not  until 
the  presidency  of  Lincoln  that  it  became  the 
dominant  one ;  and  this  can  be  said  in  spite  of 
the  equality  of  legal  conditions  which  existed  in 
the  United  States  since  the  founding  of  its  gov- 
ernment. It  was  during  the  w^ar  of  the  rebellion 
that  the  people  absolutely  came  to  the  front  in 
the  North,  which  place  they  have  occupied  since 
in  the  North,  and,  also,  in  the  South,  for  the 
southern  aristocracy  was  annihilated  in  the  war. 
We  have  to-day — we  have  had  since  the  time  of 
Lincoln — a  government  by  the  people,  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  for  the  people,  and  the  only  one  on  the 
face  of  the  earth.  The  state  of  Great  Britain,  as 
the  House  of  Commons  has  gradually  acquired 
more  political  power  in  the  extension  of  the  fran- 
chise and  in  the  spread  of  education,  is  fast 
becoming  a  democracy,  but  as  yet  it  possesses 
many  aristocratic  characteristics,  and  these  are 
still  dominant  in  that  great  empire. 
( It  is  in  the  United  States  alone  that  the  people 


THE  PEOPLE.  231 

are  absolutely  sovereign,  and  this  they  are  in  fact 
without  any  theory  of  hoio.  It  is  simply  ad- 
mitted that  the  people  possess  all  power  and  can 
do  as  it  wills.  Not  that  it  can  do  no  wrong,  as 
was  the  rule  in  regard  to  kings,  but  that  it  can 
do  as  it  wills.  The  difficulty  of  course  is  to  as- 
certain the  will  of  the  people.}  How  do  we  learn 
it  ?  Ostensibly  by  sending  men,  representing  the 
people,  to  this  or  that  council,  or  assembly,  or 
legislature,  or  senate.  These  men  come  together 
and  after  the  discussion  of  the  various  questions 
that  arise,  determine  them.  This  they  seem  to 
do,  but  in  reality,  the  questions  of  the  day  are 
determined  outside  of  these  bodies.  They  are 
determined  partly  by  the  voice  of  the  people  as 
expressed  in  the  elections,  but  chiefly  by  that 
voice  as  it  expresses  itself  day  by  day  in  the 
newspapers,  in  the  magazines,  and  in  the  speeches 
and  conversation  of  men  who  understand  public 
affairs  and  perceive  the  trend  of  public  senti- 
ment ;  by,  that  is,  the  force  of  the  new  ruler  in 
democratic  governments,  public  opinion. 
( I  speak  of  public  opinion  as  a  new  ruler,  and 
yet  as  Mr.  Bryce  has  so  admirably  shown,  all 
governments  have  rested  upon  the  opinion,  un- 
spoken it  may  have  been  and  unconscious,  but 
none  the  less  real  and  potent,  of  the  masses  of 
the  people.  "The  despotisms  of  the  East,  al- 
though they  usually  began  in  conquest,  did  not 


232  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

stand  by  military  force  but  by  popular  assent. 
So  did  the  feudal  kingdoms  of  mediaeval  Europe. 
So  do  the  despotisms  of  the  Sultan  (so  far  at 
least  as  regards  his  Mussulmen  subjects),  of  the 
Shah,  and  of  the  Chinese  Emperor  at  this  mo- 
ment." ^ 

We  must  understand  that  in  the  earlier  and 
simpler  forms  of  government  opinion  is  always 
passive  and  never  active — it  acquiesces  in  the  ex- 
isting state  of  things  because  it  knows  no  better, 
or,  if  it  knows,  perceives  no  way  that  betterment 
may  be  had.  And  very  often,  too,  it  is  overlaid 
by  superstition  and  false  religious  notions.  "  The 
difference,  therefore,  between  the  despotically 
governed  and  free  countries  does  not  consist  in 
the  fact  that  the  latter  are  ruled  by  opinion  and 
the  former  by  force,  for  both  are  generally  ruled 
by  opinion.  It  consists  rather  in  this,  that  in 
the  former  the  people  instinctively  obey  a  power 
which  they  do  not  know  to  be  really  of  their 
own  creation,  and  to  stand  by  their  permission  ; 
whereas  in  the  latter  the  people  feel  their  su- 
premacy, and  consciously  treat  their  rulers  as 
their  agents,  while  the  rulers  obey  a  power 
which  they  admit  to  have  made  and  to  be  able 
to  unmake  them — the  popular  will."^  j 

^  (The  American  Commonwealth,  Part  IV.,  Chap.  Lxxvii.,  p. 
255. ) 

2(/d.,  p.  257.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  233 

But  the  question  is,  what  is  it  that  directs  pub- 
lic opinion  toward  the  right  and  keeps  it  true  ? 
All  history  confirms  the  words  of  the  prophet 
Jeremiah  that  "  the  heart  is  deceitful  above  all 
things  and  is  desperately  sick."  ^  It  needs  some- 
thing to  cure  and  to  subdue  it,  and  that  some- 
thing man  has  found  in  his  religions.  We  shall 
not  attempt  to  study  how  religions  generally 
have  affected  the  hearts  of  men — our  study  now 
is  as  to  the  effect  of  Christianity  upon  the  white 
race,  and  more  especially  upon  that  part  of  it 
which  is  called  the  American  people.  The  effect 
of  the  teachings  of  Christ  upon  the  civilization  of 
the  west  is  the  subject  matter  of  Mr.  Kidd's  well- 
known  treatise  on  "  Social  Evolution."  He  has 
shown,  and  to  the  most  of  his  critics,  has  shown 
conclusively,  that  the  central  feature  of  human 
history  is  not  the  philosophy,  but  the  religion  of 
man,  and  that  human  progress  does  not  consist 
in  the  development  of  the  intellect,  but  rather  in 
the  growth  of  moral,  that  is,  of  religious  feeling. 
Before  the  coming  of  Christ,  religion,  as  we 
know,  was  generally  divorced  from  morality  ; 
and  it  is  because  Christ  brought  religion  and 
morality  together  and  made  them  one  and  the 
same  thing,  that  His  teaching  has  become  the 
light  of  the  world. 

It  is  precisely  in  the  United  States  that  the  re- 

>  (xvii.  9,  E.  V.) 


234  THE  STATE  AND    THE  CHURCH, 

ligion  of  Christ  is  freest  to  do  its  beneficent  work 
for  the  hearts  of  men.  Here  there  is  no  estab- 
lished church  and  no  sect  of  the  church  that  is  in 
any  way  favored  and  assisted  by  the  different 
governments  of  the  states,  or  by  that  of  the 
United  States ;  and  yet  there  is  no  people  within 
the  circle  of  the  influence  of  western  Christendom 
that  is  more  devoted  to  the  teachings  of  Christ 
than  is  the  American  people,  none  that  is  more 
truly  religious.  The  religious  side  of  the  life  of 
the  American  people  was  clearly  perceived  and 
remarked  upon  by  our  first  great  critic,  de 
Tocqueville,^  and  although  Mr.  Bryce,  our  last 
critic,  does  not  express  himself  in  as  strong  terms 
as  does  de  Tocqueville,  he  yet  avers  that  the 
ethical  standard  of  the  average  man  in  the 
United  States  is  the  Christian  standard.  "  The 
average  man  has  not  thought  of  any  other  stand- 
ard, and  religious  teaching,  although  it  has  be- 
come less  definite  and  less  dogmatic  "  than  that  of 
Protestant  Europe,  "is  still  to  him  the  source 
whence  he  believes  himself  to  have  drawn  his 
ideas  of  duty  and  conduct."  ^ 

Even  a  superficial  knowledge  of  the  people  of 
the  United  States  must  convince  a  man  of  the 
truth  of  Mr.  Bryce's  assertion.  The  American 
people  have  long  since  passed  outside  the  bands 

^  (Democracy  in  America,  Part  II.,  Book  I.,  Clmp.  i.,  p.  4.) 
'^  (The  American  Commonwealth,  Part  VI.,  Chap,  cvii.,  p.  723.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  235 

of  mediaeval  theology  and  they  no  longer  care 
for  dogmatic  teaching,  but  they  believe,  and  they 
believe  most  thoroughly,  in  the  fatherhood  of 
God  that  made  them,  and  in  the  sonship  of 
Christ,  the  universal  brother  of  the  whole  broth- 
erhood of  man.  And  it  is  practically  these  two 
beliefs  that  direct  public  opinion  toward  the  right 
and  keep  it  true. 

But  public  opinion  is  but  a  breath,  at  most  a 
thought  or  an  idea.  Does  it  not  rest  upon  some- 
thing ?  Yes,  upon  common  sense,  or,  as  we  may 
say,  upon  the  sound  practical  judgment  of  the 
people.  That  it  be  sound,  means  that  it  be  un- 
warped  by  prejudice,  passion,  fancy  or  fear ;  that 
it  be  practical  means  that  it  be  unaided  by  any 
art  or  systematic  train  of  argumentation  but  be 
the  result  of  experience  alone.  "Native  sense 
must  have  been  invigorated  or  practiced  by  prac- 
tical life  to  become  common  sense."  ^  It  is  com- 
mon sense  that  differentiates  the  Anglo-Ameri- 
can peoples  from  the  other  peoples  of  Christen- 
dom, and  this  thing  is  the  product  of  their  self- 
help  and  self-reliance,  working  upon  their  free 
minds  in  a  belief  in  God  and  in  the  brotherhood 
of  man.  Never  before  in  the  history  of  the 
world  has  there  been  manifested  in  a  people  so 
much  of  a  common  feeling  as  there  has  been  in 
the  United  States  during  the  past  thirty  or  forty 
» (Lieber,  Pol.  Ethics,  Book  I.,  Sec.  xliv.,  p.  93.) 


236  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

years,  and  this  has  been  the  result  of  the  com- 
mon sense  of  the  people.  Free  from  prejudice 
and  class  feeling,  they  have  learned  that  man- 
kind is  one,  and  that  all  men  have  for  the  most 
part  the  same  motives  and  the  same  ideas.  The 
difference  between  class  and  class  has  broken 
down  and  disappeared ;  there  are  some  rich  and 
many  poor,  but  the  rich  man  does  not  feel  him- 
self to  be  made  of  different  clay  from  his  poor 
brother.  He  knows  that  there  is  a  solidarity 
that  cannot  be  destroyed,  that  for  weal  or  woe 
he  and  his  neighbor  are  bound  together  in  indis- 
soluble ties  in  society,  as  well  as  in  politics. 
One  reason — a  practical  one — why  the  rich  man 
does  not  consider  himself  to  be  made  of  different 
clay  from  his  poor  neighbor  is  because  he  sees 
that  the  poor  man  of  to-day  may  be  the  rich  man 
of  to-morrow;  but  the  fundamental  reason  lies 
in  the  expansion  of  the  teachings  of  Christ  to 
the  realities  of  life.  "  It  would  be  difficult,  per- 
haps impossible,  to  exaggerate  the  difference  in 
the  estimate  put  upon  the  value  of  a  human  life 
in  our  own  day  and  in  the  times  that  are  now  in 
the  custody  of  written  history.  If  it  be  true 
that  the  '  individual  withers  and  the  race  is  more 
and  more '  it  may  turn  out  that  the  value  set 
upon  the  race  is  solely  to  emphasize  the  value  of 
the  individual."  ^ 

'  (Donald,  The  Expansion  of  Religion,  p.  49.) 


THE  PEOPLE,  237 

f  The  purpose  of  the  state  and  government  to- 
day is  recognized  by  all  to  be  for  the  protection 
and  welfare  of  all  men,  be  the  individual  man 
high  or  low,  rich  or  poor ;  and  this  great  thing 
has  been  brought  about  by  the  teachings  of  Christ 
as  the  same  have  been  expanded  and  carried  into 
the  practical  life  of  the  people.  ;  There  was  a 
time,  not  many  years  ago,  when  the  question 
that  Jesus  Christ  asked,  "  How  much  then  is  a 
man  of  more  value  than  a  sheep?"  would  have 
been  put  by  the  privileged  few,  "How  much 
then  is  a  deer  of  more  value  than  a  man  ?  "  But 
such  ideas  were  never  part  of  the  mental  furni- 
ture of  the  men  who  have  dwelt  within  the  con- 
fines of  the  American  republic.  The  welfare  of 
all  free  men  has  ever  been  the  end  of  the  Ameri- 
can state  and  government,  and  the  value  of  a 
man's  life  has  never  been  measured  by  the 
abundance  of  the  things  he  possessed.  In  his 
recent  book,  "  Democracy  and  Liberty,"  Mr. 
Lecky  bemoans  the  rise  of  the  democratic  spirit 
in  the  world,  and  especially  in  England,  in  a  way 
that  seems  curious  to  us  here  in  the  United  States 
who  have  learned  to  look  upon  man  as  of  pri- 
mary, and  property  as  of  secondary  importance 
in  life.  It  is  manhood  suffrage,  the  right  of  every 
freeman  to  vote  in  all  elections,  that  distresses 
him.  It  Avas  "the  indissoluble  connection  be- 
tween taxation  and  representation  which  was," 


238  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

he  says,  "  the  very  mainspring  of  English  con- 
ceptions of  freedom."  "It  was  also  a  funda- 
mental principle  of  the  old  system  of  representa- 
tion that  the  chief  political  power  should  be  with 
the  owners  of  the  land,"^  but  democracy,  he 
avers,  "  pushed  to  its  full  consequences,  places 
the  whole  property  of  the  country  in  the  hands 
of  the  poorest  classes,  giving  them  unlimited 
power  of  helping  themselves."^  And  yet  how 
humane  has  democracy  been  when  we  compare 
the  moderation  of  the  many  poor  toward  the  few 
rich  since  manhood  suffrage  has  prevailed,  to 
the  inhumanity  of  the  few  rich  toward  the  many 
poor  when  political  power  was  in  the  hands  of 
the  few  !  It  is  not  necessary  more  than  to  allude 
to  the  condition  of  the  rural  laborers  and  factory 
hands  and  miners,  before  the  rise  of  the  people, 
in  England.  Think  of  it.  It  was  in  the  year 
1834  that  Harriet  Martineau  could  write  of  the 
condition  of  the  children  of  the  rural  laborers  in 
England  that  they  "  struggled  with  the  pigs  for 
food  during  the  day, — doing  nothing  useful, 
learning  nothing  which  would  raise  them  above 
the  beasts  of  the  field ;  and  at  night  huddled  on 
damp  straw,  under  a  roof  of  rotten  thatch;  or 
went  out  to  carry  poached  game,  or  to  fire  the 
farmers'  stacks."^     And  of  the  factory  children 

'  (Vol.  I.,  Chap,  i.,  p.  2.)  '^  {Id.,  p.  33.) 

3  (History  of  England,  Vol.  III.,  Book  IV.,  Chap,  vii.,  p.  334.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  239 

she  speaks :  "  Here  were  children — little  creatures 
whose  lives  should  have  been  spent  in  growing 
in  body  and  mind, — employed  all  day,  and  far 
into  the  night,  in  the  monotonous  and  stupefying 
work  of  spinning  in  the  mills."  ^  But  the  state 
of  the  women  and  children  who  worked  in  the 
mines  was  most  forlorn.  "  In  1842,"  says  Miss 
Martineau,  "  Lord  Ashley  had  brought  forward 
a  bill  on  behalf  of  a  set  of  people  who  really  ap- 
peared to  have  been  neglected  by  all  mankind  " 
— the  miners.  "A  committee  of  inquiry,  ob- 
tained by  this  philanthropist,  laid  open  a  scene 
which  shocked  the  whole  community.  Women 
were  employed  as  beasts  of  burden;  children 
were  stunted  and  diseased,  beaten,  overworked, 
oppressed  in  every  way ;  both  women  and  chil- 
dren were  made  to  crawl  on  all  fours  in  the  pas- 
sages of  the  pits,  dragging  carts  by  a  chain  pass- 
ing from  the  waist  between  the  legs;  and  all 
lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  filth  and  profligacy 
which  could  hardly  leave  a  thought  or  feeling 
untainted  by  vice."  ^  J^or  were  the  English  mill 
and  mine  owners  the  only  sinners  against  women 
and  children,  as  the  address  of  Seth  Luther,  on 
''  The  Condition  of  the  Producing  Classes  in  Eu- 
rope and  America  in  1832 "  will  show.  Cer- 
tainly it  is  not  property  that  has  been  the  cause 
of  the  miseries  of  mankind,  for  democracy  desires 

'{Id.)  « {Id. ,  Vol.  IV. ,  Book  VI. ,  Chap.  vii. ,  p.  355. ) 


240  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

wealth  as  strenuously  as  aristocracy  ;  but  there 
is  no  gainsaying  it,  the  making  of  property  the 
thing  of  chief  importance,  and  the  welfare  of 
men  a  matter  of  little  concern,  has  been  the  cause 
of  untold  miseries,  whether  we  look  at  ancient, 
at  mediaeval,  or  at  modern  society. 

That  democracy  has  many  faults  and  many 
evil  tendencies  all  who  have  any  experience 
know,  and  those  who  have  none  can  read  Mr. 
Lecky's  book,  for  in  that  he  singles  out  and 
makes  prominent  everything  that  can  be  said 
against  the  rule  of  the  people.  But  Mr.  Lecky, 
it  must  be  observed,  writes  with  a  prejudice,  "  he 
is  a  gentleman  in  the  old  sense  of  the  term,  who 
feels  that  his  weight  as  such  is  in  some  sort 
menaced."^  But  one  thing,  among  many,  that 
Mr.  Lecky  and  writers  of  his  school  deplore  I  am 
not  convinced  is  altogether  an  evil,  and  that  is 
the  decline  of  parliamentary  government.  Par- 
liamentary, or  as  we  may  say,  representative 
government,  has  done  great  service  in  developing 
the  interests  and  protecting  the  liberties  of  man- 
kind, but  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  it  has 
had  its  day  and  that  its  usefulness  is  passing 
away.  If  it  were  not  so,  the  parliament  of  Great 
Britain,  the  congress  of  the  United  States  and 
the  legislatures  of  the  various  states  of  the  union 
would  not  exhibit  so  many  signs  of  weakness 

*  (Godkin,  Problems  of  Modern  Democracy,  p.  279. ) 


TEE  PEOPLE.  241 

and  degeneration.  The  people,  the  masses  of 
the  people,  it  is  evident,  are  far  better  educated 
and  infinitely  better  behaved  than  they  were  one 
hundred  or  even  fifty  years  ago.  There  will 
never  come  a  time,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  when 
some  central  legislating  power  or  powers  will 
not  be  required,  but  the  tendency  to-day  is  for 
the  people  to  take  ever  more  and  more  care  of 
themselves.  We  see  this  in  the  so-called  local 
option  laws,  which  now  have  existence  in  Great 
Britain  and  her  colonies,  as  well  as  in  the  United 
States,  in  the  referendiLm  of  the  Swiss  republic, 
and  in  the  submission  of  constitutions  and  of 
various  proposals  and  amendments  to  the  people 
of  the  respective  American  states.  Mr.  Bryce 
has  a  chapter  on  direct  legislation  by  the  people 
in  his  well-known  book,  on  "  The  American 
Commonwealth,"  ^  which  is  very  suggestive.  It 
is  evident  that  he  is  not  in  sympathy  with  the 
thing  he  describes  ;  but  this  lack  of  sympathy  is 
to  be  expected  from  so  accomplished  a  parlia- 
mentarian. 

But  the  people  of  the  United  States  show  that 
they  are  aware  of  their  sovereignty,  not  only  in 
the  way  of  making  laws  directly  for  their  own 
governance,  but  by  carrying  on  their  affairs  with- 
out enactments  or  with  only  the  indirect  aid  of 
them.  If,  as  Mr.  Lecky  says,  the  "  characteristic 
»  (Part  II.,  Chap,  xxxix.,  p.  463.) 


242  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

function  of  government  is  business,"  ^  it  is  in  the 
management  of  so  much  business  with  so  little 
aid  of  government  that  democracy  show^s  its 
right  to  rule.  It  is  amazing  how  much  of  the 
business  of  the  people  of  the  American  republic 
is  carried  on  without  political  guidance.  Govern- 
ment has  created  from  time  immemorial  the  fic- 
titious person,  a  corporation,  but  it  is  only  within 
the  past  fifty  years  that  this  creation  has  been 
augmented  and  developed  for  the  conduct  of 
every  kind  of  business.  By  means  of  corpora- 
tions vast  interests  which  would  otherwise  have 
demanded  the  intervention  of  the  government 
have  been  cared  for  in  ways  that  no  governmen- 
tal regulations  could  foresee,  and  for  which  they 
could  therefore  have  made  no  provision.  These 
aids  of  progress  have  increased  everywhere 
throughout  Christendom,  but  it  is  chiefly  in  the 
United  States  that  they  have  become  so  numer- 
ous, l^ov  are  these  corporations  simpl}^  confined 
to  the  transaction  of  business  ;  thousands  of  them 
are  for  charitable  and  social  and  fraternal  pur- 
poses, and  these  are  interwoven  with  the  life  of 
the  people,  and  carry  out  their  wishes  and  pro- 
vide for  their  welfare  and  happiness  in  innumer- 
able different  ways.  That  there  are  many  abuses 
that  grow  out  of  the  great  growth  of  corpora- 
tions we  all  know,  but  we  may  look  to  see  the 

'  (Democracy  and  Liberty,  Vol.  I.,  Chap,  i.,  p.  45.) 


THE  FEOFLE.  243 

people  rectifying  them  in  due  time.  But  we 
must  not  forget  that  it  is  the  corporations  \Yhich 
have  enabled  the  people  of  the  United  States  to 
subdue  this  continent,  and  to  cover  it  with  the 
good  things  that  go  to  make  up  the  comfort  and 
pleasures  of  life,  which  embody  as  it  were,  our 
western  civilization.  Again,  I  would  observe 
that  so  accustomed  are  the  people  of  the  United 
States  to  consult  and  agree  together  to  carry  on 
their  affairs,  that  not  even  corporations  are  al- 
ways requisite,  in  spite  of  their  manifest  advan- 
tages of  unity  and  limited  liability.  We  see  this 
in  the  establishment  of  clearing-houses,  chambers 
of  commerce,  and  the  like,  though  these  eventu- 
ally secure  some  kind  of  corporate  existence. 

But  is  business  the  characteristic  function  of 
government  ?  Are  there  not  interests  that  are 
higher  ?  In  the  outbreak  of  our  war  with  Spain 
the  people  of  the  United  States  said  that  there 
were,  and  these  they  pronounced  to  be  the  ends 
of  justice  and  humanity.  And  these  they  have 
since  declared  to  be  the  rightful  ends  of  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  American  people,  in  the  pulpit, 
in  the  press,  on  the  platform,  yes,  in  Congress  it- 
self; though  the  covetousness  of  the  political 
business  men  has  striven  to  make  the  people  be- 
lieve that  gain,  or,  as  Mr.  Lecky  calls  it,  "  busi- 
ness," is  the  characteristic  function  of  the  democ- 
racy of  the  new,  as  well  as  of  the  aristocracies  of 


244  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

the  old  Avorld.  It  is  because  Christian  democracy 
has  always  had  regard  for  the  high  interests  of 
life  that  we  love  and  trust  it.  The  whole  doc- 
trine of  the  fatherhood  of  God  and  the  brother- 
hood of  man  is  involved  in  the  Lord's  Prayer, 
but  until  the  rise  and  growth  of  democracy  they 
were  never  understood  nor  acted  upon.  It  is  too 
much  to  say  that  they  are  fully  comprehended 
and  put  into  practice  to-day,  but  the  people,  the 
great  masses  of  the  people,  not  only  of  our  own 
country  but  of  all  countries  throughout  the  civi- 
lized world,  are  beginning  to  feel  their  force  and 
to  follow  their  meaning.  It  is  not  only  the  sol- 
diers and  the  sailors  of  Great  Britain  and  the 
United  States  who  believe  that  they  are  children 
of  one  Father,  but  those  of  the  kingdom  of  Spain 
and  of  the  republic  of  France — those  of  every 
nation  under  the  sun. 

I  can  see  only  two  questions  that  confront  the 
people  of  the  United  States  that  carry  with  them 
no  suggestions  of  immediate  solution,  and  they 
are  the  question  of  the  alliance  of  politics  with 
business  and  the  question  of  the  too  great  atnass- 
ing  of  wealth  in  the  hands  of  a  few  individual 
citizens.  The  first  question  is  the  one  that  faces 
us  in  the  present,  the  second  the  one  which  will 
face  us  in  the  future.  A  time  was  in  the  history 
of  the  United  States  when  men  entered  the 
arena  of  politics  as  the  supporters  and  expound- 


THE  PEOPLE.  245 

ers  of  some  great  social  or  economic  principle, 
which  was  as  a  rule  alleged  to  be  found,  or  not 
to  be  found,  in  the  constitution  of  the  United 
States ;  but  all  the  great  constitutional  questions 
have  been  settled,  and  the  chief  thought  of  the 
people  for  the  past  generation  has  been  how  they 
could  best  develop  the  resources  of  the  country. 
It  was  undoubtedly  first  because  of  this  impulse 
that  men  sought  for  political  places,  or  resorted 
to  others  who  had  political  places,  for  business 
purposes.  And  if  the  businesses  in  view  had 
been  always  legitimate  and  had  been  carried  on 
in  legitimate  ways,  we  would  have  no  cause  for 
complaint  and  fear.  But  many  of  the  businesses 
that  men  have  sought  to  promote  politically  have 
not  been  legitimate,  and  much  of  the  legitimate 
businesses  so  promoted  have  been  advanced  by 
dishonorable  and  dishonest  means. 

But  this  is  not  the  worst  side  of  the  nefarious 
alliance  between  business  and  politics.  The 
worst  has  been  the  fact  that  as  outside  politi- 
cians have  seen  how  business  men  have  endeav- 
oredi  to  further  their  personal  interests  politi- 
cally, they  have  sought  and  obtained  the  posi- 
tions by  and  from  which  favors  can  be  had  by 
paying  for  them.  ISTor  is  this  all.  After  these 
men  had  attained  positions  of  political  power, 
they  learned  not  only  to  make  the  dishonest  pro- 
moters of  businesses,  legimate  and  illegitimate, 


246  THE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

pay  for  the  favors  they  required,  but  also  to  levy 
tax  upon  and  to  take  toll  from  many  legitimate 
businesses  conducted  by  honorable  business  men. 
And  so,  as  these  political  positions  have  become 
very  valuable  from  a  money  making  point  of 
view,  it  has  come  to  pass  that  the  politicians 
have  not  hesitated  to  perpetrate  frauds  of  all 
kinds  in  order  to  elect  themselves  and  their  crea- 
tures to  the  places  of  pelf  and  power.  It  is  the 
question  of  the  hour.  In  the  great  cities  of  the 
land  and  in  some  of  the  smaller  ones,  too,  the 
whole  municipal  machinery  is  in  the  hands  of  so- 
called  "  bosses  "  who  batten  off  the  business  en- 
terprises of  our  citizens.  The  honest  as  w^ell  as 
the  dishonest  business  men  are  compelled  to  sub- 
sidize and  feed  these  harpies;  the  honest  that 
they  may  not  be  suppressed,  the  dishonest  that 
they  may  be  maintained. 

How  long  this  state  of  affairs  will  continue, 
we  cannot  tell.  Yet  I  believe  an  end  will  even- 
tually be  made  to  it,  and  for  this  reason.  Party 
rancor  has  greatly  declined  in  the  United  States, 
and  there  is  but  little  place  for  political  preju- 
dice. It  is  by  rancor  and  prejudice  chiefly  that 
the  political  parties  have  been  held  together  in 
the  past,  by  means  of  which  fact  the  "  bosses " 
have  been  able  to  obtain  their  evil  ascendency. 
As  party  lines  become  more  and  more  obliterated 
they  will  become  so  first  in  municipal  elections  ; 


THE  PEOPLE.  247 

indeed,  there  is  evidence  that  they  are  less 
strongly  drawn  here  from  year  to  year.  When 
they  shall  become  wholly  effaced  and  there  shall 
be  no  more  municipal  politics,  the  regime  of  the 
"  bosses "  must  go ;  for  there  are  more  honest 
than  dishonest  men  in  our  country,  and  the  hon- 
est will  at  last  combine  and  put  to  rout  their 
shameless  adversaries. 

There  is  a  political  measure,  also,  which  if  it 
could  be  carried  into  effect  would,  it  seems  to 
me,  help  to  divorce  business  from  politics,  and 
that  is,  the  election  of  United  States  senators  di- 
rectly by  the  people.  The  senate  of  the  United 
States  is  made  up  now  greatly  of  business  men, 
and  when  we  ask  ourselves  why  this  is  so,  we 
must  answer  that  when  political  business  men 
have  obtained  the  control  of  their  respective 
state  legislatures  for  their  individual  purposes, 
they  have  sought  the  office  of  senator  as  a  way 
to  social  rehabilitation  and  preeminence ;  and 
perhaps  also  as  a  means  of  further  benefiting 
their  respective  business  enterprises.  Or,  if  this 
has  not  been  exactly  the  history  of  the  election 
of  business  men  to  the  senate,  we  must  say  that 
they  have  been  chosen  because  they  are  rich 
men,  and  have  been  able  to  contribute,  and  have 
contributed,  to  the  "  campaign  funds  "  of  the  dif- 
ferent state  legislators  and  senators,  and  then 
claimed  that  these  last  should  return  favor  for 


248  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH, 

favor  and  promote  them  to  the  high  dignity  of 
the  American  senate,  a  place  designed  for  pa- 
triots and  statesmen,  that  is,  for  men  of  the  no- 
blest character  and  of  the  highest  aspirations  for 
truth  and  righteousness  in  the  life  of  the  nation. 
]S"o  one  would  complain — rather  would  every  one 
rejoice — if  the  business  men  of  our  country 
should  be  elected  to  the  senate  of  the  United 
States  because  of  their  endeavors  to  promote  the 
welfare  of  their  respective  communities,  and  this 
should  be  the  test  of  their  fitness.  At  the  polls 
the  people  would  be  the  best  judges  of  their  hon- 
est efforts  so  to  do. 

The  question  of  the  too  great  amassing  of 
wealth  in  the  hands  of  a  few  individual  citizens 
is  more  difficult  of  solution.  That  there  will  be 
inequalities  in  the  distribution  of  wealth  all  men 
will  agree  who  perceive  that  there  are  inequali- 
ties in  the  mental  and  physical  endowments  of 
mankind ;  and  this  perception  is  well-nigh  uni- 
versal ;  but  there  need  not  be,  there  ought  not  to 
be,  the  extremes  of  inequality  between  the  multi- 
millionaires and  the  proletarians  which  now 
amaze  and  perplex  us  and  cause  us  to  fear.^  It  is 
not  at  all  likely  that  socialism  in  any  of  its  forms 
will  prevail  in  the  great  republic  except  it  may 
be  in  the  form  of  state  socialism,  that  is,  the  tak- 

*  ( Vide  Spahr,  The  Present  Distribution  of  Wealth   in   the 
United  States,  p.  158,  et  seq. ) 


THE  PEOPLE,  249 

ing  over  to  itself  by  the  state  of  certain  proper- 
ties and  interests  that  have  become  monopolies 
or  that  tend  to  become  such,  for  the  benefit  of 
all ;  such  as  railroads,  and  telegraphs,  and  other 
means  of  transportation  and  of  communication, 
and  the  articles  of  trade  that  have  come,  or  will 
come  eventually,  into  the  control  of  some  central 
combination  or  trust ;  yet,  I  hope  that  state  so- 
cialism will  never  develop  in  the  United  States, 
because,  in  my  opinion,  state  socialism,  and  in- 
deed all  forms  of  socialism,  mean  the  decline  of 
democracy.  Democracy  postulates  that  govern- 
ment from  above  shall  be  reduced  to  a  minimum. 
State  socialism  means  the  increase  of  the  office- 
holding  class  to  a  very  great  extent,  and  the  giv- 
ing into  their  hands  of  powers  that  cannot  be 
described  as  anything  other  than  imperial  and 
aristocratic. 

What  are  the  remedies  for  the  too  great  in- 
equalities of  fortune,  which  every  man  who  re- 
flects perceives  to  be  wrong  and  deleterious  to 
the  best  interests  of  the  country  ?  There  are  no 
legal  remedies,  if  we  are  to  remain  a  free  people, 
except  those  which  come  from  a  just  and  equi- 
table system  of  taxation,  and  from  enactments 
which  compel  men  to  be  honest  and  which  pre- 
vent certain  causes  of  injustice  ;  for  example,  the 
watering  of  stocks,  and  the  giving  of  special 
rates  of   transportation  to  favored  individuals. 


250  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

The  real  remedy  lies  outside  of  the  domain  of 
law,  and  finds  its  root  in  morality,  or  better,  in 
religion.  It  is  connected  with  the  simple  thing 
that  has  made  the  rule  of  the  people  possible, 
education ;  but  by  education  I  do  not  mean  so 
much  the  thing  that  has  gone  by  its  name  up  to 
the  present  time,  the  training  of  the  mental 
powers  and  faculties  merely.  I  mean  also  the 
teaching  of  men  the  principles  and  ideas  that  fol- 
low necessarily  from  the  conviction  that  there  is 
a  God  in  heaven  who  is  Father  of  us  all,  whose 
great  attributes  are  justice  and  mercy,  and  truth 
and  love,  and  who  can  be  trusted  to  be  all  these 
things  toward  His  children,  both  here  and  here- 
after, as  they  are  so  toward  their  fellow-men.  In 
other  words,  it  is  only  as  men  have  a  religious 
sanction  for  their  conduct  that  the}^  will  cease  to 
be  selfish  and  learn  to  be  liberal.  It  is  not  Avith 
wealth  that  is  acquired  by  honest  toil  and  fair 
dealing  that  the  people  quarrel,  but  w^ith  that 
which  is  gained  by  meanness  and  fraud. 

There  is  another  thing,  which,  as  it  seems  to 
me,  the  people  in  a  democracy  must  learn,  and 
that  is  that  not  the  individual  but  the  family  is 
the  basis  and  unit  of  society,  and  that  the  church 
and  the  state  must  exhibit  in  every  way  the 
family  ideal.  That  men  live  in  an  universal 
famil}^  in  the  sight  of  God  is  shown  by  the  fact 
that  Christ  taught  us  to  address  God  as  "  our 


THE  PEOPLE.  251 

Father."  This  truth,  of  course,  carried  to  its 
logical  conclusion,  must  necessarily  mean  an  uni- 
versal state,  which  would  be  conterminous  with 
a  catholic  church,  but  we  cannot  carry  it  to  its 
logical  conclusion  in  the  world  to-day,  it  is  self- 
evident  ;  but  we  can  carry  it  to  its  logical  con- 
clusion in  a  nation.  And  this  is  the  true  value  of 
the  national  state  and  its  essential  significance, 
that  the  men  of  a  nation  feel  themselves  to  be 
brothers.  The  fact  of  brotherhood  has  outgrown 
all  caste  and  class,  and  has  expanded  to  the  ex- 
tent of  nationality  at  least.  In  God's  good  time 
it  will  grow  wider  and  wider,  until  it  embraces 
the  world.  In  the  recent  rapprochement  between 
the  peoples  of  Great  Britain  and  of  the  United 
States  it  has  taken  a  great  step  in  advance.  ITow 
the  family  is  a  commonwealth  even  as  is  the  na- 
tion ;  the  family  in  the  United  States  is  not  the 
commonwealth  it  once  was,  but  this  unity  we 
must  restore,  and  this  we  can  do  in  part  by  re- 
stricting divorces  and  by  making  man  and  wife 
more  truly  partners  in  their  present  worldly  pos- 
sessions. It  is  a  matter  of  observation  in  history 
that  the  separation  of  the  pecuniary  interests  of 
man  and  wife  runs  with  looseness  in  divorce.  No 
one  would  care  to  have  the  inequalities  of  "  haron 
et  feme  "  restored,  but  all  right-minded  citizens 
ought  to  endeavor  to  make  possible  a  greater 
community  of  possessions.     History  shows  that 


252  TEE  STATE  AND   THE   CHURCH. 

the  family  is  the  basis  of  society,  and  historical 
research  has  proven  that  not  individual  owner- 
ship, but  joint  ownership,  was  the  original  way 
in  which  property  was  held  and  possessed.  There 
ought  to  be  a  joint  ownership  of  family  posses- 
sions by  man  and  wife,  and  thus  the  idea  of  joint 
ownership  would  soon  pass  to  the  people  at  large. 
Xot  that  the  joint  ownership  of  all  the  wealth  of 
a  people  by  all  the  families  is  possible  or  desir- 
able, otherwise  could  no  family  have  its  own 
proper  possessions,  but  the  ideas  that  flow  from 
joint  ownership  ought  to  and  would,  if  the  posses- 
sions of  a  family  Avere  held  jointly,  pass  to  the 
body  politic,  so  that  no  man  would  ever  say,  I 
can  do  what  I  will  with  my  own.  And  this  I 
believe  would  be  the  solution  of  the  great  ques- 
tion of  social  inequality.  Then  the  wealth,  or 
capital,  that  ought  to  be  put  into  any  enterprise, 
whatsoever  it  might  be,  would  not  be  regarded 
by  the  contributor  as  his  own  absolutely,  but  he 
would  feel  that  all  who  embarked  in  the  enter- 
prise with  him  had  some  rights  in  and  to  the 
same.  What  those  rights  would  be  exactly  no 
man  could  say ;  no  one  can  say  precisely  what 
the  rights  of  brothers  are  as  against  one  another 
in  a  human  family.  And  so  the  great  ideal  of 
the  family  in  the  nation  would  be  strengthened 
by  the  brotherly  treatment  of  the  poor  by  the 
rich,  and  the  poor  would  never  look  upon  them- 


THE  PEOPLE.  253 

selves  as  outside  of  the  life  of  society  and  out- 
side the  life  of  the  church. 

Each  community,  too,  would  become  stronger 
as  the  parts  of  it  became  more  friendly ;  more 
works  for  general  improvement  would  be  under- 
taken ;  more  individual  gifts  would  be  made  for  the 
benefit  of  all.  It  is  a  thing  much  to  be  deplored 
in  our  modern  cities  that  there  is  no  agora,  no 
forum,  no  piazza,  no  cathedral,  for  the  common 
meeting  of  the  citizens  of  a  community ;  nor  are 
there  any  games  or  pageants  which  are  under- 
taken by  the  public  for  the  account  and  pleasure 
of  all.  We  have  parades  of  various  fraternities, 
and  occasionally  a  band  plays  in  some  park  or 
public  square,  but  this  is  all  that  is  done  to  bring 
the  people  together.  There  ought  to  be  in  every 
city  a  general  place  of  meeting,  a  great  square  or 
hall,  and  there  ought  to  be  a  central  place  of 
worship,  a  vast  cathedral,  and  these  ought  to  be 
adorned  and  beautified  by  sculpture  and  painting. 
And  this  leads  to  the  conviction  that  there  must 
be  more  time  set  apart  for  the  recreation  of  the 
people,  and  that  the  Saturday  half-holiday  must 
be  made  a  permanent  institution.  Machinery 
has  so  multiplied  the  processes  of  production  that 
it  is  no  longer  necessary  that  men  and  women 
should  labor  twelve  nor  yet  ten  hours  a  day,  nor 
indeed  every  day  of  the  six  of  labor.  It  has  been 
estimated  by  statisticians  that  two  or  three  hours 


254  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

a  day  of  hard  work  performed  by  all  the  able- 
bodied  are  sufficient  for  the  support  of  all ;  but 
admitting  that  this  conclusion  has  in  it  a  certain 
amount  of  exaggeration,  we  know  that  it  is  not 
necessary  or  well  for  the  working  classes  to  labor 
as  many  hours  a  day  as  they  used  to  do,  and  that 
eight  hours  is  becoming  the  maximum  day  of 
labor  throughout  the  civilized  world.  We  who 
are  our  brothers'  keepers  ought  to  see  to  it  then, 
that  when  the  hours  of  labor  are  over  and  the 
people  have  a  holiday,  or  a  half -holiday,  they 
have  some  ways  of  obtaining  that  recreation  that 
all  men  agree  is  necessary  to  keep  a  sound  mind 
in  a  sound  body.  Mr.  Lecky  ^  summing  up  all  the 
hard  things  that  have  been  said  by  various 
writers  against  the  intellectual  and  esthetic  side 
of  American  civilization,  avers  that,  although  de 
Tocqueville,  Carlyle  and  Kenan  used  exaggerated 
language  when  condemning  the  United  States  in 
this  regard,  "  modern  democracy  is  not  favorable 
to  the  higher  forms  of  intellectual  life."  And  to 
this  conclusion  we  must  also  come  when  we  con- 
sider the  immense  extent  of  territory  and  the 
diversity  of  the  people  of  the  United  States,  and 
compare  them  with  the  small  number  "of  great 
works  of  beauty  or  of  thought,  of  long  medita- 
tion, of  sober  taste,  or  serious,  uninterrupted 
study,"  2  that  have  been  produced.     The  strength 

'  (Democracy  and  Liberty,  Vol.  I.,  Chap,  i.,  p.  131.)     « (^Id.) 


THE  PEOPLE.  255 

and  virility  of  the  nation  have  gone  into  the  ma- 
terial development  of  the  country  and  the  many 
mechanical  devices  and  inventions  made  neces- 
sary by  the  same.  But  that  the  American  peo- 
ple do  possess  imagination  and  that  of  the  high- 
est kind,  is  shown  b}^  their  wonderful  railways 
and  bridges,  as  well  as  by  the  verses  of  some  of 
the  purest  minds  the  world  has  ever  known. 
What  we  want  is  the  creation  of  a  greater  de- 
mand for  the  products  of  the  imagination  in  the 
arts  as  well  as  in  the  sciences,  and  this  can  be 
effected  only  as  the  people  gain  more  leisure,  and 
are  better  and  more  fully  educated,  and  feel  a 
oneness  with  those  who  possess  these  divine  gifts. 
It  was  not  only  the  few  wealthy  dilettanti  and 
collectors  who  appreciated  the  work  of  a  Phidias 
or  a  Michael  Angelo,  but  the  whole  mass  of  the 
people  of  Athens  and  Florence.  The  greatest 
creations,  too,  of  Zeuxis  and  Eaphael  were 
painted  to  be  seen  by  all.  Surely  it  is  because  we 
are  so  deficient  in  the  productions  of  the  noble 
arts  of  man  that  life  in  so  much  of  the  territory 
of  the  United  States  is  colorless  and  dreary,  and 
so  many  emigrate  annually  to  the  lands  of  the 
old  world.  Kuskin's  reason,  as  alleged,  for  hav- 
ing had  no  desire  to  visit  America,  because  it  had 
no  feudal  castles,  fallen  into  picturesque  decay 
and  covered  with  soft  green  moss,  is  absurd;  but 
surely  we  ought  not  to  be  content  with  the  prod- 


256  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

ucts  of  commerce  alone.  The  basis  of  the  state 
of  Venice  was  its  trade,  and  yet  that  city  be- 
came one  of  the  greatest  marts  of  the  world  in 
the  things  of  beauty. 

And  so  we  see  it  is  that  "  man  shall  not  live 
by  bread  alone,  but  by  every  word  that  proceed- 
eth  out  of  the  mouth  of  God,"  and  out  of  God's 
mouth  has  proceeded  not  only  the  things  that  are 
useful  but  the  things  that  are  beautiful,  that 
make  life  worth  the  living.  The  lily  is  not  a 
useful  plant,  but  how  highly  did  our  Lord 
commend  it.  So  also  must  the  works  of  men's 
hands  be  commended  that  have  in  them  this 
great  quality  of  beauty.  But  here  we  must 
pause  ;  the  things  that  are  truly  beautiful,  when 
wrought  by  men's  hands,  are  those  that  are  so  in 
God's  sight,  and  in  God's  sight  only  those  things 
can  be  pleasing  that  have  in  them  moral  ends 
and  ideals.  And  such  is  the  beauty  of  the  new 
Jerusalem,  the  Holy  City,  as  described  by  Saint 
John  in  the  Book  of  his  Kevelation. 

And  this  brings  us  to  the  thought  of  the  king- 
dom of  God.  When  John  Baptist  began  to  preach 
and  to  foretell  the  coming  of  Christ,  he  announced 
that  the  kingdom  of  God  was  at  hand,  and  when 
Christ  first  preached  to  men  this  was  also  the 
burden  of  His  message.  What  did  the  prophet 
and  what  did  the  Messiah  mean  ?  [N'othing  else, 
as  it  seems  to  me,  than  this,  that  the  time  had 


THE  PEOPLE.  257 

come  when  the  people  should  recognize  that  God 
is  the  great  ruler  in  the  affairs  of  men,  and  that 
all  things  must  be  referred  to  Him,  and  that 
only  such  as  are  good  in  His  sight  should  remain. 
ISTot  that  the  state  and  government  should  be 
overthrown.  Christ's  attitude  toward  them  was 
never  inimical,  but  they  were  to  change  as  the 
social  order  changed,  and  the  social  order  was  to 
change  as  men  became  more  like  unto  God :  be- 
cause in  the  kingdom  men  become  the  sons  of 
God,  as  He  becomes  their  Father.  The  rule  of 
God,  then,  in  His  kingdom,  was  not  to  be  that 
of  a  king  but  of  a  Father,  and  men  were  to  re- 
gard themselves  as  brothers.  It  is  in  democ- 
racy, I  believe,  and  in  democracy  alone,  that  the 
kingdom  of  God  can  be  realized,  for  democracy 
alone  of  all  the  governments  in  the  world  has 
acknowledged  brotherhood  to  be  the  underlying 
basis  of  the  society  which  God  founded  in  man 
when  He  endo^ved  him  with  social  attributes 
and  feelings;  it  alone  expresses  the  fact  of  a 
universal  brotherhood  in  relation  to  a  universal 
Father.  It  does  not  matter  so  much  what  may 
be  the  outward  form  of  the  state,  the  govern- 
ment must  be  one  of  brothers,  by  brothers,  for 
brothers,  for  all  are  the  children  of  one  Father. 

And  men  cannot  get  rid  of  the  fact  of  brother- 
hood. It  has  become  ever  more  and  more  the 
dominant  factor  of  their  lives.     Neither  liberty 


258  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

nor  equality  are  exactly  possible,  for  one  man's 
liberty  may  impinge  upon  another's,  and  to  one 
is  given  five  talents  and  to  another  one,  but 
brotherhood  is  possible  because  it  is  one  of  the 
basal  facts  of  life,  and  out  of  it  will  come  all  the 
liberty  and  all  the  equality  that  is  possible  and 
wise  for  the  good  of  mankind  and  for  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  world.  Yet  men  may  not  act 
toward  one  another  as  brothers ;  yes,  herein  lies 
the  fault  of  democracy,  indeed,  of  all  forms  of 
government.  Men  may,  like  Cain,  deny  that 
they  are  their  brothers'  keepers.  This  is  the 
element  of  transgression  that  is  always  to  be 
taken  into  account,  and  the  transgression  of  the 
law  of  God  is  alienation  from  Him,  is  what  is 
called  sin ;  it  leads  to  expulsion  from  His  King- 
dom. 

And  it  is  just  herein  that  Christ  comes  as  the 
great  support  and  aid  of  the  state  and  govern- 
ment. He  displaces  sin  in  men's  hearts  and  puts 
in  its  place  and  stead  the  principles  of  righteous- 
ness, and  He  does  this  in  two  ways,  by  precept 
and  by  example.  If  men  would  follow  the  doc- 
trines of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  they  would 
never  do  what  is  wrong;  if  they  would  follow 
the  steps  of  the  son  of  Man  they  would  ever  do 
what  is  right,  and  there  would  be  little  use  for 
government  and  but  little  use  for  the  state.  But 
men  do  not  carrv  out  the  precepts  of  the  Sermon 


THE  PEOPLE.  259 

on  the  Mount,  they  fail  to  follow  the  steps  of  the 
son  of  Man :  true,  but  they  try  to  carry  out  the 
precepts,  they  follow  in  some  way  the  steps. 
And  herein  it  is  that  the  church  becomes  the 
second  bulwark  (I  had  almost  said  first)  of  so- 
ciety, and  takes  its  place  alongside  of  the  state. 
It  is  the  church  that  teaches  men  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  and  the  other  great  sayings  of  Jesus 
Christ,  it  is  the  church  that  holds  up  before  the 
eyes  of  men  the  stirring  example  of  His  perfect 
life.  (^Without  the  church  the  state  would  break 
up  into  fragments,  for  the  state  is  built  upon 
only  one-half  of  the  nature  of  man.  The  church 
is  built  upon  the  other  half  and  both  are  neces- 
sary for  his  w^elfare  and  security.  Destroy  one 
and  the  other  falls  to  the  ground.  Without  reli- 
gion man  becomes  a  brute ;  without  order  he 
cannot  live  as  man.  The  church  stands  for  reli- 
gion, the  state  for  order,  and  these  two  express 
all  that  is  best  in  the  life  of  the  people,  and  just 
in  proportion  as  the  life  of  the  people  is  high  and 
noble,  so  are  they.^ 

But  more,  as  I  believe,  the  church  stands  for 
democracy  and  is  the  great  upholder  of  it.  The 
ministry  is  taken  from  the  people,  the  Word  is 
preached  to  them,  by  the  sacrament  of  Baptism 
all  are  welcomed  into  its  fold  upon  an  equal  foot- 
ing, in  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's  Supper  all 
are   recognized   and   treated  as   brothers.     The 


260  THE  STATE  AND   THE  CHURCH. 

sacraments  of  Christ  are  the  bases  of  Christian 
brotherhood,  they  are  its  symbol  and  sign,  as 
well  as  the  symbol  and  sign  of  the  Incarnation 
of  the  Son  of  God. 


0 


Date  Due 

1 

Klv2l  'J 

1 

AP  6-  -50 

, 

1 
i 

1 

i 

h  ,    . 

1 
i 

■y;^?  .i,^  o2 

i 

1 

nr  4   'R9 

! 

1 

fTBlsl! 

i 

imLZMii^ 

1       1 

mt^^ 

•*-^           i 

1 

f) 

l-^ 


